Deck the malls with heaps of data? That's what Garry Butcher would like in his Christmas stocking this year.
As retailers nationwide vie for coveted holiday ink, Butcher, the VP of marketing for Santa Monica-based real estate developer Macerich Company, has hired independent
researchers to canvas his firm's 60 shopping centers to see what shoppers are thinking about. "We want to provide the media with fact-based information on what consumers want,
what motivates them to shop, what helps them make decisions on where they are going to shop and what they are going to buy," Butcher says.
Butcher is not alone in searching for an angle that will pique the media's interest. The PR community whips its reindeer into high gear at this time of year, as corporations
and nonprofit groups attempt to tie their messages to the Yuletide theme. With reporters scratching the ground in search of holiday stories, savvy PR professionals are
capitalizing on the opportunity to spread their stories of joy, love and sugarplums.
The stories will in some cases be delivered by Soviet commandos, in spirit if not in fact. "That is how we present it, telling people Soviet commandos will crawl under barbed
wire to retrieve your item and KGB special agents will crawl along to track it," says Robb Fess, manager of the special operations for the Sovietski Collection, a catalog of
collectible items from Eastern Europe.
Fess' press releases, tongue-firmly-tucked-in-cheek, are meant to garner attention among reporters who are inundated with releases plugging the latest X-mas tchotchkes. "We
want to make it somewhat newsworthy, if not by the nature of the product than at least by the way in which we present it. Otherwise we're just saying: 'Hey, want a widget?'"
But is it a photogenic widget? After all, the Christmas/Hanukkah/Kwanza time of year just begs for images of hearth and home. Currier & Ives may have set the standard, but
editors today are not always so particular.
Sometimes, it just takes a nice slab of meat to sell the story. At Boston Market restaurants this holiday season, there will be whole turkeys and whole spiral-cut hams in
seven major markets, and Phyllis Hammond, the senior vice president of communications at Boston Market, expects that the new menu additions will provide some tasty bites for local
media
"We typically haven't made a big deal of our holiday spread [for TV] because it is just not a very photogenic story to tell. But now with the whole ham and the whole turkey, it
gives us something very photogenic," Hammond says. Add to the visuals a couple of recipe tips, plus the implicit story of how takeout food is a blessing in our hectic lives, and
you have the makings of a warm-and-fuzzy piece that could run on any number of the morning yak shows.
As for getting word out to the morning shows, Hammond says she only has to pick up a phone. In fact, the shows have to sometimes beat her to it, calling her with offers of
holiday coverage even when she has not reached out to them. "One of our advantages quite frankly is just the power of the brand. When a reporter is looking for a holiday food
story and wondering whom to cover, we don't have a lot of competition out there," she says. Of course, some of the other fast-food casual chains might think otherwise.
In the nonprofit world, meanwhile, at least some PR executives are trying to personalize a message that has been a bit remote in the past. Take, for example, the American Lung
Association of New York State. The association "still gets a great deal of money from Christmas Seals, and that's how everybody knew us as they were growing up, so we still have
to back that," says Marc Kaplan, director of communications and marketing.
Hoping for more media hits, Kaplan wants to raise the bar this year. "We are trying to put a face on the association," he says. "We want to tell personal stories, and so we are
going to be trying to find people who have been helped by the association, people who have asthma or who are trying to quit smoking."
All this becomes a holiday-themed pitch when Kaplan wraps it around the notion of togetherness. "We will talk about how it is a holiday time, how you are spending time with
your loved ones, and how these are the people who have to be protected from big tobacco," he says. "Don't you want to protect your families against bad air? Don't you want to help
them fight against the asthma epidemic?"
Will people want to read about such perils during the holidays? Sure. It's the Tiny Tim effect, the lump-in-your-throat appeal that is part of what gives Christmas its
poignancy. And reporters know it.
There are also the hard-cold-fact stories like Butcher's data-driven mall promotions, and these do just as well among journalists eager to fill the pages. That's the approach
Brian Levine is taking as PR director at office products retailer Office Depot.
Levine will highlight hot products under $100, hot tech toys, and gifts for the dad who has everything. He'll produce press releases, fact sheets, a CD-rom and B-roll to
educate the media and consumers about the best items on the shelves. Press releases, a radio news release and a satellite media tour will offer advice for gift giving in the
professional environment, as formulated by gift-giving professionals and small-business experts. Levine also will conduct a study looking at business owners and their attitudes
toward gift giving.
The lists-and-facts approach makes sense to Levine, who hopes that by making Office Depot a reliable news source it will be a more valuable PR tool than simply being known as a
company that tries to push product. "The product manufacturers already spend an enormous amount of energy during the holiday season, so as a retailer we have to take a different
approach," he says. "I'm not Sony, I am not these other companies that are pitching hot products directly to the newspapers, so we have to be more creative about how we pitch the
overall holiday season."
Contacts: Garry Butcher, 719.591.2900, [email protected]; Robb Fess, 888.442.7227 x318, [email protected] ; Phyllis Hammond, 303.216.5407, [email protected] ; Marc Kaplan, 518.453.0172, [email protected] ; Brian Levine, 561.438.2895, [email protected] ; Dianna Stampfler,
616.245.2217, [email protected]
Wrapping [PR] Packages
As marketing and media director of the West Michigan Tourist Association, Dianna Stampfler is supposed to drive business to the entire western half of Michigan's Lower
Peninsula. With the holiday season approaching, she is planning to talk herself hoarse.
Stampfler has longstanding relationships with at least three local radio stations. In the weeks before the holidays she will be on the air dozens of times talking about special
bargains, family events, entertainment for the kids. How has she come to dominate the airwaves? It's all about being accessible.
"I don't have a problem making a phone call and doing an interview on Christmas morning. I will talk to them the day after Thanksgiving while I am waiting in line in the
department store," she says. "My priority is to be available to my media, and a lot of these people know that they can call me any time. They have my cell phone number, they know
they can reach me, and so they do."
Stampfler backs up her airtime with three to four press releases a day promoting her members' businesses. By doing this, the association last year generated what it believes
was about $850,000 worth of coverage from 300 media outlets.