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June 05, 2000 Issue of PRWeek

Multimillion-dollar global Motorola account goes to Hill & Knowlton

CHICAGO: Motorola ended its six-month agency quest last week by consolidating its multimillion-dollar global PR account with Hill & Knowlton.

Middleberg buy ups Euro RSCG’s US might

NEW YORK: Besting suitors far and wide, Havas-owned Euro RSCG madeits first major play in the US PR market by snatching up Middleberg +Associates and ...

Lazio latches onto former McCain press operative Dan McLagan

WASHINGTON, DC: Even though his work for long-shot Republican presidential candidate John McCain ended in defeat months ago, GOP PR specialist Dan McLagan has decided to hitch ...

HCFA unleashes dollars 30 million RFP

WASHINGTON, DC: The Department of Health and Human Services’ Health Care Financing Administration (HCFA) has thrown a dollars 30 million mega-contract up for grabs.

News Briefs

SAN FRANCISCO: Text 100 has hired Peter Graumann as a senior account director in its San Fran office.

Hunger organization adds Salter

WASHINGTON, DC: Intent on raising hunger issues at a time when most Americans are enjoying prosperity, Bread for the World has tapped public affairs veteran Howard Salter ...

United revs its PR engine to sway public on US Air union

CHICAGO: Attempting to sell its various publics on the benefits of its proposed merger with US Airways, United Airlines jumped into PR rapid-response mode last week.

PR Play of the Week: Site looks at self-mutilation issue

Just because a Web site hasn’t gone live doesn’t mean that it can’t start revving up the PR engine. VOXXY, an online entertainment and information network for ...

Duffey hatches an Atlanta incubator

ATLANTA: Duffey Communications has unveiled Golden Egg, a new-business incubator that the firm claims is the first launched by a marketing company in the Atlanta region.

Tired of PR scapegoating, RLM sues non-profit group

NEW YORK: Claiming it is ’tired of PR firms being used as scapegoats,’ RLM Public Relations has taken a former client to arbitration for dollars 10,500 in ...

Pentagon voice upbraided for disclosing Tripp’s info

WASHINGTON, DC: The line between public and private information can be an easy one for PR pros to trip over. Pentagon spokesperson Ken Bacon found this out ...

United media embargo collapses amid controversy

NEW YORK: Six major media outlets - including hallowed news deities like The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal - agreed to keep news about ...

PRN elevates Morin to CEO, replacing outgoing Capps

NEW YORK: News-distribution colossus PR Newswire has found a new leader, promoting Charles Morin to replace outgoing president and CEO Ian Capps.

ViewSonic hands Paine hi-tech biz

PLEASANTON, CA: Fresh off its win of the dollars 2 million-plus Iomega account, Paine & Associates has been awarded a six-figure PR contract for ViewSonic, a best-selling ...

FT.com taps PN for part of dollars 15m push

NEW YORK: FT.com, the Internet arm of the Financial Times, has tapped Porter Novelli to provide the PR component of its dollars 15 million integrated marketing program, ...

INTERNATIONAL NEWS - UD&V taps CPN for UK consumer biz.

LONDON: United Distillers & Vintners’ UK arm has hired Countrywide Porter Novelli (CPN) as its lead consumer PR agency for UK brands.

INTERNATIONAL NEWS: Open Group lands Expo2000 work

BUENOS AIRES: Open Group, a local PR firm, has bested Burson-Marsteller, Hill & Knowlton and Nueva Comunicacion to win the media relations contract for Argentina’s presence at ...

INTERNATIONAL NEWS: NATO spokesperson Shea on verge of joining Burson

LONDON: NATO spokesperson Jamie Shea is on the verge of quitting his job to join the London board of Burson-Marsteller, sources told PRWeek last week.

INTERNATIONAL NEWS: Mexican prez race charts new PR territory

MEXICO CITY: Petty pre-election scuffles have tainted public perception of the three Mexican presidential candidates, leaving the country’s closest race for the presidency in 71 years up ...

INTERNATIONAL NEWS: Jaguar ramps up German PR dept

FRANKFURT: Jaguar’s German arm has restructured and enlarged its communications department, bringing in Paul Schinhofen to lead the product PR and publicity charge.

Shandwick brings in two political marksmen - one left, one right

WASHINGTON, DC: Shandwick, already the country’s preeminent public affairs shop, has added two partisan sharpshooters to its stable of political gunslingers.

FitzGerald pilfers IR staff from FRB

SAN FRANCISCO: With a handful of new clients approaching IPO, FitzGerald Communications’ San Francisco office has beefed up its IR staff, snapping up two pros from the ...

Detroit staffing crunch makes headlines

DETROIT: With business soaring during an unexpectedly prosperous year for auto companies and suppliers, the Detroit market has quietly become one of the country’s hottest - forcing ...

Do you have what it takes? PR success test unveiled

NEW YORK: Hoping to give a better answer to the elusive question ’What does it take to make it in PR?,’ Empowerment Concepts has developed a personality ...

CyberAlert prexy claims deal with supplier is close

STRATFORD, CT: Just weeks after releasing the latest flavor of its Internet monitoring service, CyberAlert is close to inking a deal with a major supplier.

SAN FRANCISCO: Versaggi Biocommunications, which specializes in PR and financial communications for biotech and healthcare companies, has signed three clients worth approximately dollars 450,000: Metazoa, Advanced BioAnalytical Services ...

Three finalists contend for Donnelley’s dollars 1m yearly biz

CHICAGO: Print giant R.R. Donnelley has narrowed its agency search to three multinationals: Burson-Marsteller, Hill & Knowlton and Golin/Harris.

Red Cross contract dispute threatens org’s reputation

HARTFORD, CT: A strike of American Red Cross blood-collection workers in Connecticut has forced the cancellation of most local blood drives and left the organization fighting to ...

EDITORIAL: Middleberg joins the acquired club

On the Middleberg + Associates Web site, there’s a section where chairman and CEO Don Middleberg reviews restaurants where he’s dined.

THE BIG PITCH - What can SAG do to sway public opinion in favor of its strike against advertisers?

George Glazer

GRASS-ROOTS PR: Big Business travels local route into China - The dust has settled in the battle over trade relations with China, and Big Business has won. How did the PNTR proponents do it? As Steve Lilienthal discovers, they took a page from their oppon

If history had repeated itself, as it often does, this is how things would have turned out with the House of Representatives’ vote on Permanent Normal Trade ...

THINKPIECE: No one likes to say ’no’ to a client. But in PR, it’s one of the most positive things we can do

As members of a service industry, we recognize that client satisfaction is the lifeblood of our business. So ingrained is the desire to please, in fact, that ...

INSIDE THE BELTWAY: China’s new status cost taxpayers a bundle in PR efforts. But who got their money’s worth?

Here we are, barely two weeks after the ’historic’ vote by the House of Representatives on the change of policy toward China - called by one pundit ...

CLIENT PROFILE: God, woman and pink Caddies at Mary Kay - Some call it a cult, others say it’s a ticket to financial independence. Opinions vary on Mary Kay, but its 600,000-strong sales force and pink Cadillacs have become American icons. Sherri

When a company’s independent sales force outnumbers employed staff 180 to 1, keeping the disparate minions motivated is crucial. You can tempt them with silver and gold, ...

ANALYSIS: Profile - De Pinto takes Stoorza into the fast lane - In less than a year at the helm of Stoorza, Ziegaus & Metzger, Dave De Pinto has had his share of ups and downs. But he’s successfully leading the California public affairs shop

It’s a PR pro’s worst nightmare. You wake up to screaming front-page headlines suggesting one of your biggest clients, a top-level state official, is a crook. And ...

ANALYSIS: Weekly Web Watch - Napster and friends are fending off bad PR with good vibrations

All the publicity surrounding the lawsuits against software company Napster by Dr. Dre and Metallica could give you a misleading impression about the state of music on ...

MEDIA: Yahoo! Internet Life covers the consumer interactive world - Ziff Davis’ Yahoo! Internet Life is one of the few consumer mags dedicated to the Internet. Claire Atkinson takes a look at the secrets of its success

Reading Yahoo! Internet Life is like looking under the microscope at thousands of cells all bumping into each other. Almost every page teems with wildly varied items ...

MEDIA: With Giuliani out, Lazio grabs the media’s attention

When New York City mayor Rudy Giuliani announced he would not run for the US Senate, Long Island congressman Rick Lazio wasted no time.

PROFILE - Joe Lockhart: Honest Joe, the White House’s straight spinner - It’s been called the second hardest job in the White House Press secretary Joe Lockhart talks to Adam Leyland about the pressure of politics, the subtleties of spin a

Joe Lockhart is a simple guy. And not just in his love of simple pleasures like the New York Mets and Bruce Springsteen. The White House press ...

KEEPING IT IN THE FAMILY: In this age of consolidation, family-run PR agencies still abound. Isadore Barmash looks at the dynasties that control some of the big and small agencies - and at the difficulties of running a family firm

Family businesses in America are fading away - that’s the impression anyway; numbers are hard to come by. Experts in PR generally agree that family-owned PR agencies ...

MARKET FOCUS - Newswires: The battle of the business wires - The rivalry between PR Newswire and Business Wire over the lucrative press release distribution market is ugly - and will only get uglier in the Internet Age. Craig McGuire reports from the ring

For decades Business Wire and PR Newswire, the two titans of press release distribution, have pounded at each other like battle-hardened heavyweights - trading blow for blow ...

PR TECHNIQUE: PHOTOGRAPHERS - Smile! The art of working with professional shutterbugs. A picture is worth a thousand words - unless you screw it up. Claire Atkinson explains how to find and work with photographers

In this image-sodden era, the trusty still photograph continues to serve its lofty purpose. As one fashion publicist neatly puts it, ’People don’t have time to read. ...