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December 21, 1998 Issue of PRWeek

Crisis PR pros battle to stem tide of bad news

LOUISVILLE: Bad business news is on the rise, with crisis PR pros struggling to stem a rising tide of stories about workplace violence and sexual ...

Hi-tech alliance takes on the might of the big firms

MINNEAPOLIS: Fifteen tech-centric PR firms have banded together as the Pinnacle Technology Group, to challenge the global supremacy of bigger firms.

McGrath takeover nets growing CLS a new PR division

MINNEAPOLIS: Carmichael Lynch Spong is set to buy McGrath Buckley Consulting Group, making it the third largest agency in the Twin Cities.

Rogers' income grows 700%

LOS ANGELES: December has proven a defining month for Rogers & Associates, with four new accounts raising its annual fee income from $1.4 million to ...

Gibbs goes to Stockbroker

GARLAND, TX: Gibbs Construction, a national commercial construction company, has chosen Beverly Hills-based Stockbroker Associates as its PR and investor relations agency of record.

WordCruncher chooses PN

SALT LAKE CITY: Search-engine technology provider WordCruncher Internet Technology named Porter Novelli for PR and strategic counsel.

JVC names R&J as PR firm

PARSIPPANY, NJ: JVC has chosen R&J Integrated Marketing Communications as its PR agency of record, formalizing a relationship that has existed for three years.

DeVries lands L. L. Bean apparel

NEW YORK: DeVries PR ended its 20th year by landing four new accounts that will push the firm's 1998 fee revenues above $5 million.

Guthrie gains six big accounts

LOUISVILLE: Guthrie/Mayes PR has landed six new accounts which include InterMedia Partners, the largest cable operator in Kentucky;

Stuart Bacon wins Wadley

FORT WORTH: Wadley Regional Medical Center has tapped Texas-based firm Stuart Bacon to implement its communications program.

Milan Capital assists Cassco

HOUSTON: Cassco Capital, an oil and gas company, has hired Milan Capital Group of Melville, NY as its first IR firm.

MWW bags food job

EAST RUTHERFORD, NJ: MenuDirect Corporation named the MWW Group for a consumer and media relations campaign.

Sterling nets Compucare

WATERTOWN, MA: Sterling Hager has landed a new hi-tech client, Compucare, a Reston, VA-based information technology service for the healthcare industry.

BM hires Hudson - DC female power grows

WASHINGTON DC: Cynthia Hudson joins the growing list of women running top Washington PR firms, following her appointment as head of Burson-Marsteller's US Public Affairs ...

Pfizer hands men's health spokesperson job to Dole

NEW YORK: Pfizer has enlisted Viagra poster boy Bob Dole to spearhead a public awareness campaign for men's health issues.

Merged banks name First Chicago's Buldak to lead

CHICAGO: A former First Chicago PR official has come out on top in the new 275-person public affairs department put in place after the recent ...

Squier, Gore's PR firm, loses Dunn to Bradley camp.

WASHINGTON DC: Presidential PR is taking its toll at Bob Squier's Washington-based political PR firm.

Crawford leaves NRCC, now head of media at NFIB

WASHINGTON DC: The National Federation of Independent Business has tapped former Republican Party PR guru Mary Mead Crawford as its director of media relations.

Party girls' quotes ignite heated reactions

NEW YORK: The New York Magazine article about pretty publicity girls is about to become a movie - but PR pros are condemning the flack-flick ...

C&B beefs up its hi-tech practice with new clients

BOSTON: Copithorne and Bellows this month beefed up its California technology practice with six new clients worth more than $2 million. They also named six ...

Davis solidifies staff with two media hires

SACRAMENTO: Governor-elect Gray Davis has recruited veteran political reporter Philip Trounstine as his director of communication, and named Michael Bustamante as his press secretary, the ...

EPB is aiming to double practice by end of 1999

BETHESDA, MD: The Earle Palmer Brown PR division has launched ambitious plans to double its practice by the end of next year.

Brandt named VP for new financial firm Sloane & Co

NEW YORK: Darren Brandt has quit Morgen-Walke Associates to join start-up financial media agency Sloane & Company.

Start of Sara Lee executive bears fruits for Ogilvy

CHICAGO: Ogilvy PR Worldwide is close to announcing a major piece of corporate business, the first fruits of bringing on-board former Sara Lee executive Anne ...

Rapid expansion at A&E Networks calls for PR boost.

NEW YORK: Cable company A&E Networks is bolstering both its in-house public relations and external agency roster to keep up with the company's rapid expansion.

GCI chooses Sherk to spearhead IR venture

NEW YORK: GCI has made a move into investor relations, hiring former Morgen-Walke executive and financial relations expert, Douglas Sherk.

Renamed Rolling Thunder touts new digital services

KIRKLAND, WA: Hi-tech PR agency MorseMcFadden Communications has changed its name, added a new partner, opened a second office and is touting its new 'digital ...

Study says PRs should pitch to local TV news

NEW YORK: If forced to rely on a single source for information, women would choose TV and men would take newspapers - but both are ...

Versaggi seals deal for Xenogen and Uros work

SAN FRANCISCO: Versaggi Biocommunications has added two new accounts to its medical/biotech roster and is nearing an agreement with a third, president Charles Versaggi told ...

Alan Taylor Communications handles account

SMITHFIELD, RI: Sunglasses maker Foster Grant has tapped Alan Taylor Communications to handle its six figure PR account - and landed uber-model Cindy Crawford as ...

B-M wins three-way grab for Dr. Pepper account.

LONDON: Burson-Marsteller has won its first retained account with Cadbury Schweppes with a mission to promote soft drink brand Dr. Pepper, as the drink seeks ...

US expansion for NAPR with launch of New York office.

MONTREAL: In an attempt to make inroads in the US financial communications market, Canadian public relations firm National Public Relations has opened an office in ...

Bell South set to hire Ketchum for its Panama base.

PANAMA CITY: Bell South Panama has narrowed its search for a public relations firm down to the local Ketchum affiliate, according to Juan Jose Berberian, ...

Adidas kicks-off review of UK consumer account.

LONDON: German sports giant Adidas is reviewing its largest UK consumer PR account, which is worth over $330,000 in annual fees and spreads across all ...

US firms must adapt to EU, urges panel

WASHINGTON DC: American PR agencies in Europe need to work harder to understand the specific national cultures and languages - despite the imminence of the ...

TV veteran Pollard quits ABC switching to Toyota Motor Company.

NEW YORK: Veronica Pollard has quit ABC after more than 17 years with the network broadcast operation.

Brill shuffle aims for a lighter tone at watchdog mag

NEW YORK: Brill's Content, the media watchdog magazine, is currently undergoing a series of editorial changes.

Ginsberg grabs pole PR position

NEW YORK: Rupert Murdoch has hired a top-level communications strategist to help him change perceptions of News Corp.

UK mag giant in takeover talks with Petersen

LOS ANGELES: Business-to business publisher Petersen is in talks to be acquired by the major British magazine group Emap.

ABC strike still not resolved

ABC public relations executives may spend Christmas out of work if their union does not hammer out a deal with the network.

Omnicom to acquire AMV

The world's largest communications group, Omnicom, will acquire the shares in ad agency Abbott Mead Vickers that it does not already own.

Sobieraj moves to Showtime

Cynthia Sobieraj has been named Showtime Networks director of business development.

NBC may switch to pay-TV

NBC has said it is considering migrating the network to cable to charge for the service in order to wipe out the huge fees it ...

USSB bought by Direct TV

The strongest satellite TV company in the US, Hughes Electronics' Direct TV gained a boost last week when it agreed to acquire United States Satellite ...

CBS IPO third largest ever

CBS raised $2.87 billion last week through an initial public offering of its radio division, Infinity Broadcasting.

Bartlett will run Oxygen web site

Geraldine Laybourne, the Oxygen Media founder who is launching a cable channel with Oprah Winfrey has lured Sarah Bartlett assistant managing editor of Business Week ...

Largest audience to date for CBS

Last week, CBS attracted the largest average weekly audience for the season to date. It drew a total audience of 13.3 million against NBC's 12.8 ...

Xmas movies arrive with a flurry of hype.

Among the December traditions in America, one of the most eagerly anticipated is the flurry of motion picture releases timed to coincide with the holidays ...

New small breed are future heroes

Whilst the Bursons, Fleishmans and Edelmans of this world are busy building mammoth global businesses, a new breed of exciting small and medium sized agencies ...

Hi-tech PR jobs boom - It's a seller's market in hi-tech job surge - Hi-tech is the fastest ...

Hi-tech PR jobs boom - It's a seller's market in hi-tech job surge - Hi-tech is the fastest growing field in America, yet PR is ...

Looking back at this year's newsmakers, who would have been your ideal client - and why?

An 'ideal' client should understand the value of PR, be facing a formidable challenge and have the resources - not to mention the will - ...

Inside The Beltway

I was recently being interviewed by a reporter for a comment on the acquittal of former Secretary of Agriculture Mike Espy. And asked for a ...

Newswires - do they overstep the mark? - If you pay a newswire to distribute your ...

PR professionals and newswires have become embroiled in a bitter battle over the control of editorial content within press releases. In fact, the very role ...

Recent events reveal that crisis management extends to fielding political ...

Crisis management is widely accepted as a must for any company operating in the international arena, but very few operators give enough thought to fielding ...

Hi-tech's hungry herald - Maura FitzGerald has transformed her journalism career into a ...

Growing up with nine siblings, Maura FitzGerald learned how to get herself heard above the din. She now puts this ability to constructive use: making ...

Recent changes catapult radio to the major leagues - Radio has long played second ...

Despite the hype attached to the Internet, radio is fast gaining the attention of Wall Street. Broker reaction to the recent spin-off of the CBS ...

From Viagra to Microsoft, from sex scandals to home run hitters, PR played ...

You can bet that sports and entertainment will always score highly when it comes to a ranking of good publicity. And this year's survey has ...

The 1.5 billion dollar boom - Custom publications are a quick and ...

'Everybody wants to have a magazine,' says Dick Stockton, vice president and general manager of the Forbes Special Interest Publications Group.

Weekly analysis of who's doing what and why.

Bayer mounted a series of special events to mark the respective 100th anniversaries of the discovery of aspirin by a Bayer chemist and the advent ...

Hedge funds must hone their communication skills, too - Hedge funds need PR too, say ...

A recent Forbes article rightly noted that when it comes to hedge funds, nobody on Wall Street 'wants to kill the golden goose.'

NBA players donate receipts despite financial hardships

It took a little while, but locked-out NBA players bowed before public pressure and took the highly unusual step of giving the proceeds from their ...

Strike scene took a spin during hit ABC sitcom shoot

It was not the type of PR that strike-torn ABC needed.

Bell teaches customers how to dial

Is a PR campaign needed to teach people how to use the telephone?

Weekly Web Watch - Pfizer fights uphill battle over illegal online domain names.

Pfizer, the drug company that improved humankind's lot by inventing Viagra, this month succeeded in preventing a porn web site from using the address www.viagrafalls.com.

Times orders its DJs to keep quiet over radio station

The New York Times, that bastion of journalistic integrity and civil liberties, is facing PR fallout from a direct order it gave on-air personalities at ...