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December 20, 1999 Issue of PRWeek

Monsanto pares BM work in wake of biotech protest

NEW YORK: Monsanto truncated its relationship with Burson-Marsteller last week, ending a number of projects involving the company’s bioengineered food products.

Weber, Cunningham dollars 70m deal in works

PALO ALTO, CA: Weber PR Worldwide will soon become the owner of one of the industry’s most coveted and available prizes, Cunningham Communications.

Kellogg’s drafts FH into its PR army

BATTLE CREEK, MI: Kellogg’s dramatically expanded its use of external PR last week, adding Fleishman-Hillard to a PR army that already includes Porter Novelli and a large ...

Jaguar snatches PR vet from Ford

DEARBORN, MI: Highly regarded automotive PR veteran Stuart Dyble has traded in his Ford for a Jaguar.

Motorola calls on PMK to reach the stars

LOS ANGELES: Seeking to undercut Nokia’s current status as cell phone to the stars, Motorola has launched a multimillion-dollar marketing and publicity push to court Hollywood’s elite.

NEWS BRIEFS

CHICAGO: Doug Dome has acquired controlling interest in Dome Newark Wolf Communications. Prior to arriving at the agency, Dome had served as managing director of PR for ...

Potomac answers call to tame Hillsdale PR anarchy

HILLSDALE, MI: Following a series of personal scandals that disgraced a once-proud institution, Hillsdale College has turned to PR to right its sinking ship.

eWatch adds Y2K weekend service

NEW YORK: As technology companies nervously await potential fall-out from Y2K glitches, eWatch has added special Y2K weekend coverage to monitor public discussion and news stories about ...

DLJ event reignites media access row

NEW YORK: In the wake of Donaldson, Lufkin & Jenrette (DLJ) barring members of the press from its media industry conference earlier this month, the debate over ...

Young swaps AOL for party start-up role

MENLO PARK, CA: Former America Online PR pro Maggie Young has traded in a top post with the Internet giant for a little bit of mambo.

Gingrich and Eisner hit the road for Fleishman’s CA tech summit

WASHINGTON, DC: Fleishman-Hillard has taken a new tack in order to secure more hi-tech business in California and hype its public affairs capabilities: hitting the road with ...

Miramax steals a NY politico to run corporate PR arm

NEW YORK: Miramax has lured Matthew Hiltzik away from New York’s Democratic Party.

As Oscars loom, Miramax releases winning formula

LOS ANGELES: Miramax, perhaps Hollywood’s most adept player of the publicity game, has unleashed its annual assault on Oscar.

Rumors of Ben & Jerry’s sale prompt PR

SOUTH BURLINGTON, VT: Amid rumors that Ben & Jerry’s is about to compromise its reputation of corporate responsibility by selling out to a multinational, several grassroots campaigns ...

OpenTV chooses MS&L, gets rid of Miller-Shandwick

MOUNTAIN VIEW, CA: OpenTV has dumped stateside agency of record Miller-Shandwick and handed its dollars 500,000 US account to Manning, Selvage & Lee.

Burson taps Toiv for DC shop boost

WASHINGTON, DC: Burson-Marsteller added further public affairs muscle last week by hiring former White House deputy press secretary Barry Toiv.

Internet supplier sues PR Newswire for libelous report

NEW YORK: An online retailer filed suit against PR Newswire (PRN) and several other hi-tech companies last week, claiming that the defendants libeled it ’throughout the world ...

INTERNATIONAL NEWS: Kupper makes bold move into Europe

LONDON: Kupper Parker Communications, the largest independent PR agency in St. Louis, made a bold move toward international expansion last week, paying roughly dollars 1 million to ...

INTERNATIONAL NEWS: Shrewd PR leads to Labastida landslide

MEXICO CITY: PR played a pivotal role last month in helping Francisco Labastida win Mexico’s first-ever major-party presidential primary.

INTERNATIONAL NEWS: GCI Mexico nets Special K

MEXICO CITY: The GCI Group has won the PR account for Kellogg’s Special K cereal in Mexico.

INTERNATIONAL NEWS: H&K and Ketchum invade Germany

HAMBURG: Multinational firms descended upon Germany last week, with both Hill & Knowlton and Ketchum ramping up their presence in the region.

Start-up InfoWide launches Internet management tool

SAN JOSE: PR firms looking for a way to manage and automate financial relationships with clients now can do so online with a new Web-hosted, rent-on-demand service.

Government aims to place human face on PR efforts

WASHINGTON, DC: The federal government, historically not known for its PR tact or its sensitivity toward the needs of the press, is trying to humanize its communications ...

BET considers firm hire for image blitz

WASHINGTON, DC: Black Entertainment Television Networks (BET), far and away the country’s largest minority-targeted media conglomerate, is launching an extensive marketing effort and may be looking for ...

R. Duffy Wall nabs Tulsa airport work

TULSA: In an effort to secure its share of federal funds, the Tulsa Airport Authority (TAA) has turned to public affairs specialists R. Duffy Wall and Associates.

In Brief

MENLO PARK, CA: Alexander-Ogilvy has announced the addition of three new clients worth dollars 1.5 million: Communities.com, a real-time rich media network; Netmind Technologies, which provides products and ...

McDonald’s nails Coffing, finally filling vacant post from within

OAK BROOK, IL: McDonald’s concluded its lengthy search for a top PR pro last week by promoting from within.

General Magic in TSI consolidation

SUNNYVALE, CA: General Magic, which this summer launched a new consumer Web service called myTalk, has announced the hiring of TSI Communications as its PR firm of ...

Pro-traders pick up post-WTO pieces with PR push

WASHINGTON, DC: Business organizations interested in promoting trade have begun to wade through the post-WTO rubble of their PR strategies, and have already restarted their quest to ...

Government sets meeting dates to clarify PR process

WASHINGTON, DC: The federal government is about to get serious in its effort to sort out its muddled marketing processes.

Homepage.com hooks MTV exec

PASADENA, CA: Trading in the glitzy world of entertainment publicity for the brave new world of a hi-tech start-up, former MTV Online and DreamWorks marketing pro Tonya ...

Cadillac PR polish strives to wipe out stodgy image

DETROIT: Hoping to revitalize its stodgy image, Cadillac is preparing to launch an international PR campaign early next year.

Politics 2000: the Internet could woo younger voters

WASHINGTON, DC: The 2000 election represents a divide between television and the Internet as the dominant medium in American politics.

New Venture adds dollars 1m hi-tech work

PORTLAND, OR: New Venture Communications (NVC), a hi-tech specialist, announced last week that it has landed four new accounts worth more than dollars 1.1 million.

COMMENT: Editorial - Is the golden era of PR stunts over?

Looking back on the life of publicity maven Jim Moran (see Analysis, p13), one question immediately comes to mind: is the golden era of publicity stunts over?

The Big Pitch: What advice would you give Hillary Clinton in order to revitalize her campaign?

Steve Syatt

ANALYSIS: Publicity stunts - Moran: stunt father or outdated prankster?

James Sterling Moran, the paragon of the publicity stunt, died October 18 at the age of 91. He left behind a legacy of sheer nerve that put ...

THINKPIECE: How to turn the next trade show you attend into a publicity bonanza for your company

Trade shows are a gold mine for story leads that sustain a journalist’s editorial calendar for months. Participating in a trade show is a ticket to extensive ...

INSIDE THE BELTWAY: Although Bush gets a C on his Acheson book report, the GOP probably won’t pick McCain

Bush’s performance in two GOP candidate ’debates’ in the past month has turned the presidential race upside-down - or at least guaranteed a real contest. The overall ...

ANALYSIS: Client Profile - How Visa is equipped to wage war on crises/When the Justice Department fired off an anti-trust suit against Visa USA last fall, the credit card giant had its crisis PR plan in place. The company now runs its public affairs opera

On December 31st the war room will be manned, ready to respond to any Y2K crises. The top brass will be in attendance as well. If ...

ANALYSIS Profile: Cox: Lone Star State’s chief communicator - Forget Chuck Norris - Mike Cox is a real Texas Ranger. When a crisis strikes, the spokesman for the Texas Department of Public Safety is there to calm the waters. Michele Foster takes a

’Just call me a spokesman for DPS,’ recites Mike Cox, chief of media relations for the Texas Department of Public Safety (DPS), whenever a journalist asks how ...

Weekly Web Watch: eBay: world’s most compelling and entertaining flea market

In the spirit of the holidays, I’ve decided to share with you my fantasy PR job. I’m a journalist, but from time to time I’ve wondered, if ...

MEDIA: Hey now! Get your client off - uh, on - with Howard - The Howard Stern Show may not seem like the typical venue for serious PR pros to place clients. But, as Claire Atkinson reports, the executive producer wants you to know it’s not all sex

Gary Dell’Abate, executive producer of the Howard Stern Show, rarely gives interviews. But he wants to correct some misconceptions about one of radio’s most successful and controversial ...

Media Watch: It’s not fun and games for toy e-tailers this holiday

Last year was considered by many to be the first e-Christmas - the year that the Internet met with Christmas shopping. As e-Christmas enters its second season, ...

1999 THE YEAR IN REVIEW: Myriad mergers. Corporate restructurings Million-dollar accounts. The ongoing battle with advertising. It was a busy year for the industry. PRWeek looks back.

AGENCY ACQUISITIONS

MARKET FOCUS: PENNSYLVANIA - The Pennsylvania PR story. Although Pennsylvania is a major agricultural state, it offers a diverse PR scene. As Kelley Crowley reports, the real action occurs in newly dubbed ’Philacone Valley’ and ’Ro

There’s an old Pennsylvania saying that the land between Philadelphia and Pittsburgh is Nebraska - Pennsylvania has the largest rural population in the nation and its economic ...

PR TECHNIQUE: PITCHING TO PR AGENCIES - 10 Tips for courting a PR agency. It used to be that PR agencies went foraging for clients. Now - in this topsy-turvy world - it’s increasingly the other way round. Aimee Grove explains how to get noticed by

Remember the pre-dot-com days, when new business was actually something even the hottest PR firms actively sought out? As many client-side PR pros are learning, the shoe ...