STATE FARM ADDS G/HI
FOR PERSPECTIVE
State Farm Insurance Cos. has hired Golin/Harris International, a part of Interpublic, to position it as a player in the life insurance business. The Bloomington, Ill.-financial services company will continue its 15-year relationship with WPP Group's Burson-Marsteller for corporate and product support work, according to Rock Jenkins, assistant VP-public affairs. G/HI was brought onboard to provide a "different perspective to the table."

Ellen Mardiks, GH/I's chief marketing officer, told O'Dwyer's that Susan Puflea, senior VP, will be responsible for the account. She will be assisted by Fred Cook, CEO; Keith Burton, chief client officer; Scott Farrell senior VP, and Mardiks.

State Farm is following the same "multi-agency approach" to PR that rival Allstate Insurance displayed last month when it added Weber Shandwick to the line-up. The IPG unit was hired for corporate positioning, while WPP'‘s Hill & Knowlton will continue its four-year run doing other projects.

Jerry Swerling (Malibu, Calif.) handled the State Farm search. State Farm is the largest auto and home insurer in the U.S.

EDELMAN CONNECTS WITH TIBCO
Edelman has won software maker Tibco's six-figure U.S. PR account, emerging from a 12-firm field that was pared to a handful of contenders. Blanc & Otus, a Hill and Knowlton unit, had the work but declined to participate in the review, according to Bob Berger, Tibco's director of global communications.
He told this NL the installation of a new marketing team at the company sparked the review, which began late last year.

Tibco, which had revenue of $270M last year, makes software that integrates companies' disparate software and computer systems.
Edelman's Silicon Valley office will head the account for Tibco, which is based in Palo Alto.

SCHERING-PLOUGH GETS LUX
Schering-Plough has named Julie Lux director/global product communications and advocacy development. She joins from Pfizer, where she helped integrate Pharmacia Corp.'s drugs for Parkinson's disease, overactive bladder and women's health.

At's -P, Lux will be in charge of the company's line-up of primary care, animal health and consumer product offerings. She reports to Mary-Frances Faraji, VP.

Lux has more than 25 years of communications experience. She has held posts at Germinder & Assocs., National Rural Health Assn., and ran her own firm.

RF CHECKS OUT OF FOUR SEASONS
Ruder Finn will cut ties with the Four Seasons Hotels and Resorts chain on April 30 after a six-year run.

Richard Funess, president of RF/Americas, said the account had become less satisfying for the PR firm.
"The work become more tactical and less strategic in nature," he said, so RF decided it was time to move on. Funess would not disclose the size of the Four Seasons budget.

Elizabeth Pizzinato, Four Seasons' PR director, has not been reached. Four Seasons operates more than 60 properties in 30 countries. The company is based in Toronto.

WAG ED WINS KYOCERA MITA
Waggener Edstrom Strategic Communications edged Ruder Finn for the six-figures Kyocera Mita America account. A dozen firms were considered by the Fairfield, N.J.-based unit of Japan's Kyocera Group.

Peter Hendrick, director of marketing communications at KMA, credited Wag Ed's "IT heritage and solid media relationships" in announcing the win. The KMA business will be handled out of the PR firm's Stamford, Conn., office.

KMA markets a line of printers, digital copiers and imaging systems. Wag Ed will assume brand-building activities its new client. The company, on its website, uses the slogan "The New Value Frontier" to position its products.

M Booth & Assocs. was the incumbent on the account.

Bob Finlayson has joined Burson-Marsteller as CEO of its northern California operation and managing director of its technology practice. Hewlett-Packard and SAP are B-M's key tech accounts.

Finlayson was at Edelman PR Worldwide, managing its Microsoft Xbox business. His 20-year tech PR stint included posts at Blanc & Otus and Cunningham Communication. He has handled Sony Computer Entertainment, TiVo, Charles Schwab and a raft of startups.

Finlayson also was VP-communication and marketing at the Video Software Dealers Assn. He began his career as a journalist in Washington, D.C.
Heidi Sinclair heads B-M's tech practice.

DAYTONA 500 GETS `PASSION.
Mel Gibson's movie, "The Passion of Christ," will be featured during the Daytona 500 on Feb. 15 as Interstate Batteries plans to paint a plug for the picture on the hood of its racing car driven by Bobby Labonte.

Norm Miller, chairman of the Dallas-based company, said his company is "privileged" to promote the film because "this outstanding movie factually portrays the most important 12 hours in history."

Interstate has promoted other films, such as "Toy Story" and "The Hulk," Miller told O Dwyer's . "It's what we do for publicity," he said, adding that Interstate has lined up a push for the sequel to "Shrek" following "The Passion."

Miller saw a screening of The Passion, and was "taken aback" by its artistic quality. "That's what you get when Mel Gibson is involved in a film," he commented.

He has invited James Caviezel, the actor who plays Jesus, as his personal guest to the event.
Caviezel drove the 50th anniversary Chevrolet Corvette pace car at the beginning of the Indianapolis 500 race in `02. He will be in the Interstate Batteries pit on race day, cheering on the car.

Interstate, said Miller, can't divorce itself from the controversy surrounding the film that opens on Ash Wednesday, Feb. 25. To Miller, much of the uproar is based on a "misunderstanding."

He said the Bible does not condemn the Jewish people for the crucifixion of Christ. Miller said it was the political leadership that had Christ killed.

The company directs people to a booklet, "Is the Passion of the Christ Anti-Semitic," that provides feedback from "Jewish and Christian people who have seen the Passion."(www.mastermediaintl.org/ guest/index.htm.).

Labonte was the winner of the `00 Winston Cup, and is racing in his 12th Daytona. This is Interstate's 13th season as primary sponsor of the No. 18 Joe Gibbs Racing car. Miller said Joe Gibbs PR people and executives from Universal recommended that Interstate get involved with the Passion project.

NBC will televise the Daytona 500.

Drops Gibson's Quotes

Interstate sent a release via PR Newswire shortly after 9 a.m. on Feb. 6 that included quotes from Gibson about the sponsorship. It issued a correction about an hour later, which deleted those quotes.

It also changed an attribution of one quote from Gibson to the more generic "filmmakers."

The revised statement reads: "Filmmakers say ‘The Passion is intended to inspire, not to offend."

The initial release read: "No matter what the media says, Gibson says ‘The Passion is intended to inspire, not to offend."

Miller said he was unaware that two news releases were issued. "Maybe Gibson's people didn't like the quotes," he said.

Interstate is the top selling brand for replacement auto batteries in North America.

GCI JUMPS ON
`OFFSHORING BANDWAGON.
Grey Global Group's GCI unit is sponsoring an "offshoring summit" in New York on Feb. 18 to discuss what CEO Bob Feldman calls a "flashpoint issue." India's National Assn. of Software and Services Companies, which uses Hill & Knowlton for PR, claims shipping jobs to the subcontinent will help the U.S. offset a potential labor shortage.

Executives from Citigroup, Aetna Life, Delta Air Lines and Nike have already signed up for the GCI event that is "closed to the press," according to spokesperson Sue Pagano. The media, she said, are excluded to encourage a free-flowing dialog among panelists and the audience.

Panelists will explore the impact offshoring has on a "corporate reputation, customer relations and employee loyalty," and "if there is a risk in waiting."

GCI client, Cap Gemini Ernst & Young, has scored a place on the panel. Bill Frech, VP/business process outsourcing service line leader, will talk about stakeholder communications and corporate reputation.

Feldman will open the session with an overview, and Debjani Deb, the firm's chief strategy officer who is a native of India, will close it. GCI will foot the bill for lunch. There is no charge for the summit.

PR PROS NEED EDUCATION,
SAYS WRIGHT.
PR pros need to learn more about their profession but many "couldn't care less" about PR education, Prof. Donald K. Wright told 250 PR people at the International PR Assn.'s Golden World Awards dinner Feb. 5 at the Union League Club, New York.

"We'll never fix PR education in this country or elsewhere until educators and practitioners care enough to fix it," he said, adding: "And PR never will be considered a profession by anyone outside of our field until we do that."

Wright, who holds a Ph.D. from the Univ. of Minnesota, was installed as IPRA's 2004 president, becoming the first full-time university professor ever to serve as IPRA president. He succeeded Ceyda Aydede, general director of Global Tanitim, Istanbul, Turkey.

Wright said lawyers and those in many other professions "know much more about them than most PR people know about their field." PR, he said, started out with "technician-based, one-way communications , not much more than shoot-from-the-hip publicity," but today it has evolved into "relationship-building and two-way communication."

PR plays an "extremely important role in what happens in business and government, but most of the world's people still do not know what we do," he added.

Wright said IPRA's financial situation has gone from a $100,000 debt several years ago to cash reserves of about $200,000.

The group, which celebrates its 50th anniversary next year, has built its membership from below 1,000 to 1,125. Members are from 100+ countries.

"We are proud to say the IPRA locomotive is no longer derailed, but is back on the track and headed in the right direction," said Wright.

CNN REGROUPS NEWS BUREAUS.
David Bohrman, who was producer of CNN's "NewsNight," has been named chief of CNN's Washington, D.C., bureau, succeeding Kathryn Kross, who is getting a new role with the network.
NewsNight will be run by its senior producers until a replacement is found.

Bohrman's appointment was part of a regrouping of CNN's 11 bureaus into four regions, Northeast, Southeast, Midwest, West.

Boston and New York, which will make up the Northeast region, will be managed by Karen Curry in New York.

Atlanta and Miami will occupy the Southeast region and will be led by MaryLynn Ryan in Atlanta.
Edith Chapin in Chicago will run the Midwest region, which includes the Denver and Dallas bureaus.

The Los Angeles bureau chief, Pete Janos, will manage the Western region, including Seattle and San Francisco.

Each region will have a newly designated point-of-contact on the assignment desk and will continue to report to Nancy Lane, VP/news.

Steve Robinson, a former reporter and editor at Time Inc., who was most recently head of CNN Sports Illustrated, was named to oversee the National desk.

Robinson, who will be charged with developing stories and series for the network, will be looking for story pitches from every corner of the network, according to Princell Hair, CNN/U.S. general manager.

Kim Bondy was named to head the Features unit, which is expected to play a greater role under the new system set up by Hair.

"Viewers rank medical, science/tech and entertainment news as among the most interesting and I plan to make those content areas an even greater part of our programming," Hair said.

UTNE'S TOP EDITOR JOINS ODE.
Jay Walljasper was hired as executive editor of Ode magazine's international English edition.

Walljasper currently is editor and editorial director of Utne Magazine in Minneapolis, where he has been since 1984.

Ode was established in The Netherlands in 1995 by Jurriaan Kamp, who is editor-in-chief. The English edition was started in the U.S. last October. It is now read in 73 countries.

Walljasper said he is "truly pleased to be joining a global magazine devoted to telling another side of the story. Ode offers a fresh perspective that people do not expect to find in the media. This includes the often-overlooked good news that can inspire us in our lives here at home."

Prior to Utne, he was a travel editor at Better Homes & Gardens and the cultural editor at the political newsweekly In These Times.

Walljasper will remain in Minneapolis, according to Jane Trombley at Temin and Co., a New York-based firm that handles Ode's PR in the U.S.

STEVENS TO EDIT WEEKEND JOURNAL.
Amy Stevens was named editor of The Wall Street Journal's "Weekend" section, succeeding Jonathan Dahl.

Stevens, who has been deputy Page One editor since August 2000, will start her new job in March, reporting to deputy managing editor Joanne Lipman.

TIME EDITOR TO BE
MUSEUM CURATOR.
Richard Stengel, a longtime writer and editor for Time magazine, has been named president/CEO of the National Constitution Center in Philadelphia.

Stengel, 48, who will assume his new position on March 1, has been national editor at Time, in charge of domestic and political coverage. Before that, he was the magazine's cultural editor and managing editor of Time.com.

Stengel, who played on Princeton's 1975 basketball team, became an aide and speechwriter in 1999 for presidential candidate Bill Bradley, who also had played on the team.

He co-authored Nelson Mandela's autobiography, "Long Walk to Freedom," and wrote "You're Too Kind: A History of Flattery," which was published recently.

Lisa Beyer will replace Stengel as national editor, and Romesh Ratnesar has been named world editor.

PEOPLE
Michael Wolfe, media columnist for New York magazine, is joining Vanity Fair magazine as a columnist and contributing editor on March 1.

Jillian Davison, fashion editor of Harper's Bazaar, and Heather Hodson, features senior editor, have left the magazine.

Suzanne Kirschner was named senior technology editor of Popular Science magazine.

Chris Napolitano was promoted to executive editor of Playboy magazine.

Jennifer Romolini has joined Time Out New York magazine as editor of its health and fitness department, called "Chill Out."

Sridhar Pappu, a media columnist for The New York Observer, a weekly paper, is joining Sports Illustrated as a staff writer.

Kim Gerbasi, who has been "Today" supervising producer, was renamed executive producer of "Today in New York," a morning newscast that airs on WNBC. She replaces Nancy Han, who was moved to the 5 p.m. and 6 p.m. newscasts.

The Golf Channel and Natural Golf are looking for four golfers to feature in a new eight-part reality series premiering in June, called "The Natural Golf Makeover Challenge." www.thegolfchannel.com.

(Media news continued on next page)

SPANISH-LANGUAGE PAPERS INCREASE.
The Wall Street Journal will write and produce a weekly section for Hoy, a Spanish-language daily newspaper that is published in the U.S. by the Tribune Co., Chicago.

The section, which will appear every Thursday in the New York, Chicago and Los Angeles editions, will consist of eight tabloid pages of Spanish-language content and advertising.

The focus will be personal finance and technology, careers, small business, and other business and finance information.

Stories will be selected, translated and paginated by a team of editors, with access to the global content of the Journal.

The Journal already provides a weekly section to The Washington Hispanic in D.C., and has published a daily Spanish-language section, The Wall Street Journal Americas, in Latin American partner newspapers since 1994.

PrensAmerica Corp., publisher of La Raza Newspaper, will preview Chicago's first Spanish-language auto magazine at the 2004 Chicago Auto Show, which runs Feb. 6-15.

La Raza Autos y Mas, a weekly, will target Chicago's Hispanic auto consumer, covering new products, executive changes and buying and maintenance tips.

Jorge Mederos, who is overseeing content and the five-person editorial staff, can be reached at 773/273-2900 or [email protected].

Long Island Hispanics Targeted

In New York, a battle is shaping up for Hispanic readers who live on the East End of Long Island.

The Southampton Press is about to start a Spanish-language weekly, Nuestra Prensa, which will compete with El Independiente, a weekly paper that ad man, restaurateur and East End newspaper publisher Jerry Della Femina, plans to launch in April.
Isabel Sepulveda was named editor of Nuestra Prensa, which will begin publishing in late March.
The Southampton Press also publishes the Press of Manorville & Moriches.

Della Femina, who also owns the Southampton Independent , the East Hampton Independent and the Riverhead Independent, plans to distribute 20,000 free copies of El Independiente a week.

Joe Shaw, editor-in-chief of the Southampton Press, said original stories will be written for the Spanish weekly using bilingual reporters and freelancers.

Della Femina's paper will be largely based on translations of his English-language weeklies. No editor has been named.

PLACEMENT TIPS
Barron's is starting a new continuing feature, "Hedge Funds Monthly," to provide the latest news and information on this type of investment.

Ed Finn, president/editor of Barron's, said editors and reporters will regularly provide the following:
In-depth interviews with hedge-fund managers; data and analysis on the performance of hedge funds; articles and columns on fund strategies, and sectors of choice and cash flows.

CaribPR.com has been started as a press release distribution service by veteran Guyanese journalist Felicia Persaud, CEO of Hard Beat Comms. in Brooklyn, N.Y. ([email protected]).

Persaud said anyone can enter their press releases and photos, pay a minimum of $100, and have their prepared information disseminated to more than 300 media outlets in the U.S. and the Caribbean.
Distribution information appears on the Hardbeat news.com website.

Night Sky is a new nationwide magazine about astronomy that will hit newsstands on April 13.
The bimonthly magazine will be targeted at "backyard astronomers," featuring a how-to section for telescope owners; jargon-free science and hobby information, and overviews of telescopes, accessories, books, software, and other astronomy products.

Kelly Beatty is editor of Night Sky, which will be published by Sky & Telescope, which started publishing in 1941.

The company is headquartered in Cambridge, Mass. 617/864-7360.

NYFWA PREZ SEEKS MEMBERS.
The new president of The New York Financial Writers Assn. said his top priority is to enroll more journalists, PR pros and students as members in the 66-year-old group.

Brad Finkelstein, who is an editor at National Mortgage News, said he especially wants to stop the "slump" in active membership, which has dipped to 200, its lowest level in several years.

Finkelstein hopes to double the number of business/ financial journalists during his term. "If each member brings in just one person, we can do it," he said.

An interim financial report, which was issued at the annual meeting on Jan. 28, shows the group has a total of 291 members.

That number include 32 "associates" who are mostly PR pros; 43 "life" members, who pay no dues, and 16 "student" members, who get a reduced membership rate.

Finkelstein said the drop in active members is largely the result of a "purging" of individuals who have not paid their annual dues in the past two years.

About 100 members have been dropped, including 50 last year, for this reason, he said.

As a result of the dropoff, dues revenue went down to $9,835 this year from $11,140 in 2003.

From a financial standpoint, NYFWA expects to end its fiscal year with a record-high bank balance. As of Jan. 26, the interim report shows the group has $405,486 in checking and savings accounts, up from $364,355 in 2003.

NEW SITE OFFERS
BUSINESS BEAT TIPS.
BusinessJournalism.org is now available as an online resource for editors and reporters who cover business issues.

The new website is published by the Donald W. Reynolds National Center for Business Journalism at the American Press Institute in Reston, Va.

The site will provide daily business headlines, market news, a business term glossary, job listings, tips for journalists, organizations listings and academic programs.

The site also has articles from business journalism leaders, such as Diana Henriques, The New York Times; Anne Marie Squero, The Wall Street Journal; Jim Flanigan, Los Angeles Times; Jason Zweig, Money, and Mary Flannery, The Philadelphia Inquirer.

FASHION WIRE DAILY EXPANDS COVERAGE.
Fashion Wire Daily, New York, a news service devoted to fashion business news, trends and runway show coverage, has introduced new columns.

Maya Singer has joined as managing editor to oversee news and feature assignents.

Chip Cordelli, a Williamsburg, N.Y.-based writer, covers lifestyle products and services for "Wired Life"; Paula Conway, a freelance travel writer, writes "Unwired," which focuses of lifestyle, leisure and travel topics, and Jenny Peters and Liz Snead are writing and editing "Wired West," a daily column covering the happenings of Hollywood and celebrities.

The flight of high-tech, accounting, engineering, legal, financial analysis and other white-collar jobs to India and other lands is a concern of PR.

How long will it be before "dial-for-dollars" U.S. PR pros are replaced by salespeople in India doing the same "Did you get my release" phone calls?
India, with a "huge supply of English-speaking, educated, dedicated workers, is happy to take knowledge-based jobs for 10% to 20% of what U.S. employees receive," wrote Publisher Mort Zuckerman in the Feb. 4 New York Daily News.

PR is the worst-performing category at Omnicom, WPP Group and Interpublic, according to the financials of these margin-obsessed conglomerates.
PR's infrastructure has been weakened in recent years because few new PR pros had any experience (or friends) in the media and their ability to build such friendships has been hampered by the hostility of management to reporters and the lack of expense accounts that would help them to meet reporters.

Omnicom's John Wren recently bragged about boycotting the entire press for 15 months. We re sure his thousands of PR employees took notice.

The expected appointment of PRSA COO Catherine Bolton to a longterm contract when her's expires Dec. 31 raises the issue of what happened the last time PRSA signed such a contract.

PRSA's 1999 executive committee headed by Sam Waltz as president signed a five-year contract with Ray Gaulke as COO starting on Jan. 1, 2000. But as of Jan. 1, 2001, Gaulke was replaced by Bolton, who had been hired as chief PR officer. She was the sole PR person at the Int l Copper Assn. Gaulke got $230K in salary in 2000 plus $26K in pension. His expense account in one year was $49,000.

Gaulke shifted to the PRSA Foundation where he was supposed to get much of his pay working on the $2.6M KIDS anti-drug drive funded by Johnson & Johnson. PRSA insider Pat Jackson won a $200K pilot program. His "pressless" program proposed two-hour workplace sessions at which parents would learn how to warn their children about drugs.

J&J withdrew all funding as of July 31, 2001.

The sudden departure of Gaulke with four years still to go on his contract and his replacement by a person hired to do PR has never been explained. He continues to be paid but the amount is a secret.
Sources now say that 2001 president Kathy Lewton and others felt they had to stop the free-spending ways that characterized the Gaulke years (1993-2000). PRSA's board also is responsible for actions that have had a lasting impact on the Society.

PR Journal Ditched

One of the first actions of PRSA following the appointment of Gaulke was killing the monthly PR Journal in its 50th year and replacing it with the monthly tabloid Tactics and the quarterly Strategist.

Despite numerous claims that one or both would be profitable, they lost, and continue to lose, about $1 million yearly. PRJ had cost about $500K yearly.
Another bold stroke came in January 1995 when Gaulke told the PR Service Council (formed to win a greater role for exhibitors at national conferences) that PRSA was closing its exhibit hall. That was the end not only of the exhibit hall (for five years) but the Service Council. Regional exhibit halls were mentioned as a possibility but none was ever held.

Gaulke said he wanted to have one overall sponsor of the conference in Seattle that year such as IBM or Intel. No such sponsor was ever obtained.

Many of the 38 exhibitors in 1994, who had paid $1,100 each, were incredulous at the cancellation of the exhibit hall, a staple of conventions of all types.

Also in 1994, a $133,000 ad was taken in the Wall Street Journal to publicize Silver Anvil winners. The ad solicited inquiries. Less than 100 came in.

PRSA's spending on travel, hotels and meals for officers and staff skyrocketed 261% from $274,441 in 1992 to $717,478 in 2000 while total expenses only grew 81% from $5.2M to $9.4M.

Helped PR Week

Gaulke and 1995 president John Beardsley, dissatisfied with coverage of PR by U.S. trade publications, went twice to London to encourage Haymarket to publish a U.S. edition of PR Week, promising use of the 19,000 membership list of PRSA for initial circulation. Gaulke, in a letter, urged PRSA's advertisers to advertise in PRW and its members to subscribe.

PRW competed with Tactics & Strategis for ads and soon launched an awards contest that competed with the Society's Silver Anvils. Steve Pisinski, '98 treasurer, said the help to PRW was "neither board initiated nor board approved" and called it improper.

`Big Bath' Necessary in 1999-2000

The costs of't &S and other items were masked by balance sheet maneuvers through much of the 1990s, resulting in a $1.1 million "big bath" being taken in 1999 and 2000. PRSA didn't publish its 2000 Bluebook of members. Money had been booked too early coming in (the deferred dues account was drained from $904,787 in 1991 to $169,530 by 1995) and too late going out (many expenses, especially on't &S, were deferred). The balance sheet is still out of whack since PRSA books about $1.75M in dues income before it's earned.

Board member Frank Stansberry had walked out of the 1999 meeting in Vancouver to protest the awarding of the Gaulke contract by the executive committee without the approval of the board.

If a new longterm contract is to be given to Bolton, the entire board should approve of it and the members should know the details of it.

--Jack O'Dwyer