Even before Hurricane Katrina made landfall at the end of August, big-box retailer Office Depot had stepped up to the plate, pledging $1 million to the American Red
Cross in support of anticipated relief efforts. That early entry helped position Office Depot as a business leader in the effort to put the pieces of peoples' lives and
businesses back together. As a result, the media showed a particular willingness to highlight the retailer's efforts.
"It effectively positioned us out front," says Brian Levine, public relations director of Office Depot. "By the time the hurricane hit, we were already established as being
among the first contributors, so the media included us in the very earliest roundups of the corporations that had made contributions."
But it took considerable coordination to turn that early financial gift into a media opportunity. A few days before the hurricane hit, business leaders from throughout the
company got together on a conference call, including top executives, heads of every business unit and representatives of every functional area in the company. Together, they set
the $1 million figure, and PR leapt immediately into action.
"Once the decision was made on the Sunday prior to the storm hitting, the big challenge was in contacting the media on a Sunday night," Levine says. "We put a press release out
over PR Newswire. We also worked our media list to contact the breaking-news editors and the night editors at all the major broadcast networks, at the national news outlets
like The Wall Street Journal and USAToday as well as our 'Office Depot watchers list' - all the people who watch our business regularly, and the community and
philanthropy editors."
At the same time, releases went out to diverse Web-based news outlets in an effort to get things moving within a tight news cycle. "The hope was that the online outlets would
cover it immediately and that the others would either cover it on Monday or at least begin to inquire about the company and what we were doing," Levine says.
PR's job was made easier by Office Depot's readiness to follow up on its initial pledge. Among other programs, the company:
- Offered city officials in New Orleans the entire contents of five stores (worth an estimated $4 million) to help get the city up and running;
- Provided $13 million in water, batteries, office and school supplies through its partnership with Feed the Children;
- Distributed 1,000 backpacks filled with school supplies to help area children go back to school; and
- Matched all employee contributions dollar-for-dollar.
Together, these efforts gave the PR shop plenty of meat to feed to the press, which showed early signs of biting. The CEO appeared on CNBC's "Wake Up Call" and on Fox
News' "Your World With Neil Cavuto." Executive interviews appeared in USAToday and in The Wall Street Journal.
"Initially, the challenge was in making sure that general information simply got out to as many media outlets as possible. After that, we turned toward making sure we were
included in roundup articles," Levine says. With other companies competing to have their contributions noted, Office Depot put out fresh press releases and reached beyond national
media to connect with local newspapers nationwide.
In some sense, Office Depot was especially well-positioned to respond to Katrina, both in terms of its relief offerings and in its ability to parlay that relief into positive
media coverage.
"Being based in south Florida, we are always aware of the impact of hurricanes," Levine notes. "From a corporate standpoint, we have a very strong business-continuity program,
we have crisis teams, and we have a business-recovery and disaster-planning infrastructure. We have people from all different functional areas of the company constantly working
and coordinating to ensure that Office Depot will be able to operate no matter the natural disaster."
To that end, PR found itself running not just external media efforts, but also significant internal communications initiatives in Katrina's wake. By dialing a toll-free number,
employees could hear about the status of their stores, and they were directed to HR contacts. Fliers went up in stores and ads appeared in newspapers telling workers about seven
stores that had been set up as relief stations. PR also crafted FAQ documents, distributing them through e-mail, on the internal Web site and through portals accessible from any
Office Depot store.
Even with all these diverse programs in play, both internally and externally, the media effort not could have gained traction were it not for the company's long history of
philanthropic work - a history that gave credibility to the Office Depot story at a time when many others also were eager to tout their own relief efforts. The company gave
$250,000 to tsunami relief, for example, and it has given extensively to various hurricane cleanup efforts in Florida.
"Office Depot has great credibility in the philanthropic area because of our track record," Levine says. "This is not a one-off thing for the company. I emphasized that for the
media, and it was very well-received."
Contact: Brian Levine, 561.438.2895, [email protected]
Give Early, Give Often
Office Depot's PR surrounding Hurricane Katrina offers an objective lesson in the value of getting in early. The company pledged $1 million in relief aid even before the
hurricane hit, a preemptive move that helped it win high-visibility coverage in a range of high-profile publications, including:
- The Christian Science Monitor
- FOX News
- Reuters
- The Washington Post
- The Telegraph
(U.K.) - CNN Money
- Forbes
- MSN Money
- The San Diego Union Tribune