U.S. EYES PR EFFORT FOR BOLIVIA

The U.S. government’s agency for humanitarian aid is looking to hire a PR firm to tout its work in Bolivia as diplomatic relations have strained with the left-leaning South American country.

The U.S. Agency for International Development wants a firm to produce a public diplomacy campaign to increase Bolivian citizens’ understanding of U.S.-funded programs in the country since the 1950s.

First-year budget for the campaign, slated to begin in October, is set at $500K and the resulting contract will carry two option years.

USAID wants to highlight its emergency supply efforts, opportunities for the poor, and other economic and social welfare programs it has funded in Bolivia.

The campaign comes amid anti-government unrest in the Andean country.

Ties between Bolivia and the U.S. have strained in recent years amid the election of a leftist coca farmer president, Evo Morales, who has strengthened ties to Venezuelan president and Bush Administration nemesis Hugo Chavez.

Earlier this month, Bolivia expelled the U.S. ambassador in La Paz after accusing him, as well as U.S.-backed programs administered via USAID, of inciting the anti-government protests, which turned violent.

Chavez, in a show of solidarity for Morales, also expelled the U.S. ambassador to Caracas.

DURAND EXITS OGILVY

Michael Durand, who joined Ogilvy PR Worldwide in June `06 as managing director healthcare strategy & planning, exited July 31 as the WPP Group unit retrenches and steps up its drive to increase billable hours.

Ogilvy still has a photo of Durand on its website. It also has an e-mail address for him.

He is pictured with Kate Cronin, Ogilvy’s managing director of global healthcare. She told O’Dwyer’s there is no plan to replace Durand.

Marcia Silverman, Ogilvy’s CEO, did not return an e-mail.

Durand, who spent 21 years at Porter Novelli before exiting as healthcare head, is exploring various opportunities.

“There is nothing rock solid yet,” he said.

Durand, who doesn’t want to rush into anything, is looking for a place where he can “help uncover best practices and really see what forces are driving healthcare today.”

He is at [email protected].

PICKENS PICKS PATTON BOGGS

Texas oil tycoon T. Boone Pickens has hired Patton Boggs to win Washington support for his PickensPlan program designed to wean this country off foreign oil.

Pickens wants to develop domestic energy alternatives such as wind, hydro and natural gas to reduce the dependence on energy imports. He has launched a $60M marketing campaign to hike awareness of the program.

Patton Boggs, which describes PP as a “social welfare organization whose mission is to bring energy independence to the U.S.,” has Benjamin Ginsberg and Joshua Greene working on the effort.

Ginsberg was national counsel to the two Bush-Cheney campaigns, and played a major role in the Florida recount fiasco of `00. Greene worked for New York City Democratic congressmen Jerry Nadler and Eliot Engel.

Pickens used Sloane & Co. to handle PR surrounding the July launch of PP. Washington-headquartered North Bridge Communications has been drumming up PA enthusiasm for the effort.

ANVIL LOOKS FOR PR FIRM

New York-based Anvil Knitwear is looking to hire a PR firm to support its corporate and marketing communications efforts. The initial budget is set for $150K/year.

Anvil wants to raise its visibility in the marketplace via publicity, media relations, special events, corporate identity development, lobbying, newsletters and investor communications.

Ellen Singer, executive VP-marketing, wants interested firms to contact her by Sept. 26. She is at [email protected] and 212/476-0353.

The PR contract is to be awarded during the first week of December.

EDELMAN LANDS BURNS

Edelman has named the well-respected Nicholas Burns chairman of its newly created global PA advisory board. The Harvard University professor retired earlier this year as the State Dept.’s senior career diplomat. He exited as under secretary of state for political affairs.

Burns, who is said to have been negotiating a position with Patton Boggs, earlier served as permanent U.S. rep to NATO and ambassador to Greece.

During the Clinton Administration, Burns was spokesperson for the State Dept., and a member of the National Security Council on Russian affairs.

Edelman says its PA work represents about 15 percent of its overall business. The firm has just opened offices in Rome and Berlin.

GROUP HITS ‘PR’ TIES TO FDA SITE

The head of a medical communications firm attacked by a watchdog group for its ties to an FDA-supported consumer website said conflict-of-interest accusations are baseless.

The Center for Science in the Public Interest last week highlighted the non-profit group EthicAd’s production of an FDA website launched last week to help consumers understand drug ads. CSPI noted EthicAd is based in the offices of Atlanta firm Shaw Science Partners, which has handled communications for pharmaceutical industry clients.

Michael Shaw, an MD who is president of Shaw Science Partners, told O’Dwyer’s that the non-profit group was set up to rein in DTC advertising. “Nobody in the organization nor I certainly don’t have any connection whatsoever to direct-to-consumer advertising,” he said. “I’ve never gotten a penny for it.”

Shaw said the group advocates volunteer guidelines for DTC ads by the pharmaceutical industry. “We originally formed because we are critical of DTC advertising and we advocate standards for DTC ads,” he said.

CSPI is calling on the FDA to scuttle the site, which is hosted by FDA.gov. CSPI contends that explanatory language on the site is more geared to pharma copywriters than consumers. “It’s not that any of the information presented on this website is wrong, per se,” said Merrill Goozner, director of the CSPI’s Integrity in Science Project. “But if the goal were to educate consumers about drug ads, the site is a dismal failure.”

EthicAd bills itself as a “nonprofit, independent organization committed to providing the most accurate and relevant information about prescription medications.”

Shaw is listed as executive director of EthicAd, although his role as head of Shaw Science Partners is not mentioned and he is only cited as a former medical advisor for the National Library of Medicine and the National Institutes of Health.

Shaw also disputed CSPI’s labeling of his company as a PR firm saying his firm is a “scientific communications company” that explains the mechanism and action of drugs. His firm’s website touts its work for drugs like Viagra, Byetta, and Rozerem.

METROLINK SPOKESPERSON RESIGNS

Metrolink has accepted the resignation of its spokesperson, Denise Tyrell, after she pinned the blame for the commuter rail line’s crash that killed 25 people on the rail agency.

Tyrell contends that Metrolink is ultimately responsible for the engineer who apparently ran a red light which caused the commuter train to slam into a Union Pacific freight train.

Ron Rogers, chairman of the Southern California Regional Rail Authority, characterized Tyrell’s remarks as premature, and is waiting for completion of a National Transportation Safety Board probe into the accident. Tyrell says she only spoke the truth.

The NTSA has ordered Metrolink staffers to refrain from further comments about the crash pending completion of the probe.

Metrolink, according to its website, has agreed to do so.

BOUGH SHIFTS TO PEPSI

Bonin Bough, executive VP/director of Weber Shandwick’s global social, interactive and emerging media practice, is moving to Pepsi at the end of the month. He will serve as director of global social media at the soft drinks marketer.

Bough was founding member and senior VP at Ruder Finn Interactive prior to joining the Interpublic unit. As RF’s director of strategy and architecture, he developed programs for corporate, consumer, healthcare, non-profit and technology clients.

Earlier, Bough was an interactive advisor for Neural Net, working on projects such as the launch of the Jordache website. Since 2000, Bough has been a professor at New York University’s Center for Publishing Graduate Studies.

Screengrab is the name of WS’ digital interactive practice. It offers social gaming, search space advocacy, onsite dialog and screengrabber offerings to clients such as General Motors, Unilever and Milk Processor Education Program (got milk?).

Chad Boettcher, senior VP for corporate responsibility, is moving into the role of campaign manager for Screengrab,” according to Jennifer Norton, a WS spokesperson.

APCO GUIDES TESCO’S U.S. PUSH

Tesco, the U.K. grocery giant expanding its presence in the U.S. market, is working with APCO Worldwide’s Sacramento office for its U.S. PR as it scouts more western locations for its “boutique” stores.

APCO has previously worked with the company in the U.K.

Tesco opened its first U.S. store – a Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market – last fall in Sacramento, the first of 72 locations it has unveiled in the western U.S.

Fresh & Easy markets are significantly smaller than traditional U.S. grocery stores and domestic chains have moved to try building scaled back versions of their own locations to compete as big-box retailers and even pharmacy chains have cut into the grocery market here.

Brendan Wonnacott, a manager for APCO/Sacramento, said the office has been working with Tesco since 2006 on comms. and PA in the three states they are currently located in — Nevada, Arizona and California.

MWW STEERS MOTOR COACH’S CHAPTER XI

Motor Coach Industries, a leading intercity bus maker, is using MWW Group to handle media regarding its Chapter XI filing.

The Schaumburg, Ill.-based company filed a “pre-packaged” bankruptcy filing on Sept. 15 and hopes to emerge from Chapter XI in February.

MCI was founded in 1941 by Harry Zoltok, who first put an 11-passenger coach on a Packard chassis.

Greyhound and Mexico’s Grupo Dina each owned MCI for periods of time until New York private equity firm JLL Partners took ownership in 1999.

MCI blamed a sharp decline in new orders among reasons for the filing during its 75th anniversary year.

MWW’s Rich Tauberman and Susan Kenney are working the account.

LAT STAFFERS SUE TRIBUNE, ZELL

Tribune Co. and its CEO Sam Zell have been sued by five former and one current Los Angeles Times staffers who believe ownership has failed to live up to its fiduciary responsibilities.

The suit filed in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles contends that Zell and former Tribune CEO Dennis FitzSimons took the company private to enrich themselves at the expense of the employee stock ownership plan. Zell dismissed the suit as frivolous.

The complaint, which seeks class action status, claims Tribune violated the Employee Retirement Income Security Act, which covers pension plans. Plaintiffs want to recover their alleged losses and replace the Tribune's board of directors.

The suit was filed by Jack Nelson, retired D.C. bureau chief; Corie Brown, who wrote about food and wine; Myron Levin, ex-consumer affairs reporter; Walter Roche, former reporter, and Henry Weinstein, ex-legal affairs reporter.

Dan Neil, LAT's auto columnist, is the only current employee who is listed as a plaintiff in the case.

MCCLATCHY RETRENCHES AGAIN

McClatchy Co. CEO Gary Pruitt is cropping another 1,150 full-time staffers (10 percent of its work force) in a bid to regain financial footing.

Half the cuts will be via voluntary programs and "managed attrition." The Sacramento-based company expects to shave $100M in expenses over the next year because of the cutbacks. That figure excludes severance outlays of about $20M.

Pruitt said the job cuts are part of the strategic plan to become a "hybrid print and online media company." They are necessary due to the "relentless economic downturn."

McClatchy reported that August revenues were down 15.7 percent and ad revenues dropped 17.8 percent compared to last year's month.

For `08, overall revenues are down 16.7 percent, while online ad income is up 11.2 percent.

McClatchy publishes the Miami Herald, Charlotte Observer, Kansas City Star, Fort Worth Star-Telegram and Sacramento Bee.

THOMSON REUTERS TIGHTENS BELT

Thomson Reuters is responding to the financial chaos that is roiling worldwide global markets by issuing a hiring freeze and curbing travel.

Devin Wenig, chief of markets division, told staffers via a memo that the firm is "aggressively" managing costs, and has put a ban on external recruitment.

The only exemptions are jobs in low-cost markets such as India, China and Poland.

GILT GRABS LYNN

Susan Lynn, who stepped down as CEO of Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia in June, is now chief of the Gilt Groupe, an online shopping site for upscale goods.

GG, according to its website, is “dedicated to providing its members with access to coveted fashion and luxury lifestyle brands at sample sale prices.” Membership is by referral only. The site sells overstocked luxury goods for limited time periods.

Launched in November, GG was headed by founder Alexis Maybank, who now becomes chief strategy officer.

PAPER GROUP RAPS YAHOO-GOOGLE TIE-UP

The World Assn. of Newspapers wants to thwart the Google and Yahoo advertising agreement on anti-competitive grounds. It believes a deal poses a negative impact on the ad revenues that the search companies provide to newspapers.

WAN says the current competition between Google and Yahoo enables its members to receive competitive returns for online advertising on their sites and fair prices when they buy paid search advertising.

The proposed deal, according to Gavin O’Reilly, president of WAN, would result in less revenues and higher prices for the 18K newspapers and 77 national newspaper assns. that belong to WAN.

The trade group also fears the hook-up would give Google “unwarranted market power over important segments of online advertising.”

WAN has called on the U.S. Dept. of Justice, Competition Bureau of Canada and European Commission’s Competition Directorate to examine and then block the deal.

CARTER NAMED REUTERS MULTIMEDIA HEAD

Chris Carter, a veteran of CNN International and BBC News, has signed on at Thomson Reuters as global editor of multimedia for Reuters News.

He is based in New York, and reports to Reuters editor-in-chief David Schlesinger.

Carter stepped down as VP/managing director at CNN in `07. He left the BBC in `96 after a 20-year stint.

COX TO RADAR

Ana Marie Cox, Washington editor for Time.com, has been named D.C. editor of Radar.

Cox writes features for Radar and contributes to its website’s “Fresh Intelligence.”

Cox, the founding editor of D.C. gossip blog Wonkette, will continue to contribute to Time.com.

She wrote a novel, “Dog Days,” in 2006 and is under contract to write a non-fiction title.

“Radar has established itself as a publication devoted to scandal and style, two words that are synonymous with the District of Columbia,” said Cox. “Well, maybe not so much the style part.”

Richard Wallace, VP/editor-in-chief of TechInsights, has been named to lead the combined global content teams at EE Times and TechOnline, both owned by United Business Media.

Junko Yoshida, Editor-in-Chief of EE Times; Patrick Mannion, Editorial Director of TechOnline; Richard Nass, Editorial Director of Embedded Systems print and online operations; and Peter Clarke, EE Times Europe News Director will report to Wallace.

Wallace is a former EE Times staffer who led international business development at TechInsights.

(Media news continued on next page)

RADIO, TV JOURNOS HAVE TO PITCH ALSO

Entertainment TV and radio producers and reporters said at an industry event this month that journalists, like PR pros, have to pitch stories, only their targets are viewers.

PR pitches must lead to stories that are easy to sell, tease and promote to viewers and readers, they said as the Los Angeles chapter of the Entertainment Publicists Professional Society hosted entertainment journalists on Aug. 21 at the International Cinematographers Guild.

Bonnie Tiegel, senior supervising producer for “Entertainment Tonight” and “The Insider,” told PR pros at the event that they need to come up with the “nugget” that makes a story move forward.

“If your story has a connection to Hollywood, it is a fun and interesting story, it will be easy to sell, tease and promote,” she said. Tiegel said the show’s tease and promo are crucial to attracting viewers and can be even more important than an A-list name or connection. She used the example of “American Teen,” a documentary about Indiana high school students during their senior year that debuted at the L.A. Film Festival. “I don’t know any of the people, but it was easy to promote,” she said.

Tiegel said “The Insider” looks for “a little more edgy” stories with a different hook. She prefers email pitches at [email protected].

KABC’s George Pennacchio, a three-time Emmy Award winner, said, “The question producers ask is how do I tease that? If they don’t know how to promote the story, then they will have less interest in it. If I get a good tease and pitch for a story, then often I will get the green light.”

Pennacchio ([email protected]) also warned publicists who bring their celebrity clients up to him when ABC is covering another story live on a red carpet event. “Just to be put on the spot is a little tough, especially if you do not know who that person is. And that happens on a regular basis,” he said.

AP Radio Wants Broad Interest

“Because of who I work for, I have no local interest,” said Rosalie Fox of AP Radio Network Entertainment. “What my audience wants is a recognizable name, recognizable celebrities or a tie-into a recognizable movie, TV show, stage plays or something like that where they don’t have to scratch their heads in the 30 seconds in the time telling the story.”

Fox, who works from 2-10 pm, prefers an email pitch first, and even though she works evenings, she’ll make an exception for celebrities in the morning if needed.

“I only have 40 seconds and I work with recognizable names in movies or A-list celebrities,” she said. Fox checks her email in the morning at [email protected].

Crystal Vision Media entertainment reporter Ross Crystal said phone interviews are fine for his syndicated coverage.

Crystal, who has a one-minute-thirty-second syndicated report that airs on KFWB, Los Angeles, said: “Remember, 90 seconds moves like a freight train, but since it is syndicated your story is moving nationally.” Like all the participants, he prefers exclusives and email pitches ([email protected]).

Crystal also said he will sometimes take a local story and offer it to the news desk at KFWB.

“There are two audiences we are serving,” he said. “The audience in the car, and the audience of the stations we are serving,” said Crystal.

Radio pros also said publicists should not exclude or select radio reporters last for interviews. “If you get on APTV or APR, your story has been exposed to half the planet.

AP’s Rosalie Fox said her former news director at a radio station had a big picture of a crowded freeway posted on the outside of his office door that read, “How many of these people are watching TV or reading the newspaper?”

COKE STAYS ATOP BRAND RANKING

Coca-Cola remains the No. 1 corporate brand, according to BusinessWeek and Interbrand’s annual rating, but Google, Apple and Amazon were among top gainers over the last year.

Dropping dramatically were troubled financial brands Merrill Lynch and Morgan Stanley, and clothing retailer Gap, although more recent developments, including the troubles at Merrill and AIG, were not factored into the valuations.

Coca-Cola has topped the ranking for eight straight years. This year, IBM took the No. 2 slot from Microsoft and Google moved into the top 10 after hitting 20 in 2007.

BW noted that as the business climate has worsened in recent months a number of blue-chip companies have announced plans to cut marketing costs, including Coca-Cola (No. 1) and Visa (No. 100).

Jez Frampton, CEO of Interbrand, said the ranked companies are a reflection of the global economy. “The current credit crisis in the U.S., the growth of emerging markets and the increased emphasis on sustainability are all key trends that resulted in brands rising or falling on the list," he said.

Interbrand's methodology evaluates brand value on the basis of how much it is likely to earn for the company in the future using a combination of analysts' projections, company financial documents, and its own qualitative and quantitative analysis to arrive at a net present value of those earnings.

Critics are spreading a lot of blame around for the current financial debacle but two themes are surfacing—the secrecy and complexity of many of the financial dealings and lack of adequate regulation by the Securities & Exchange Commission, the “cop of Wall Street.”

John McCain demanded that SEC chair Christopher Cox be fired but Barack Obama countered with “fire the entire Administration.” Obama got a “bounce” in the polls.

“The SEC has been morally bankrupt for some time now,” wrote Michael Lewis (Liar’s Poker) for Bloomberg News.

Financial writer Christopher Byron said the same thing several years ago when writing for the New York Post. He called the SEC an ineffective “paper tiger.”

Lewis faults SEC chair Cox for failing to regulate companies that overextended themselves with sub-prime mortgages and for harassing the short sellers “who have been trying to tell the truth” about the failing markets.

Cox is described as “a nice man who has no real idea of what happened.” But he deserves blame, says Lewis, because of “the way he treated people with the nerve to speak the truth to power.”

Banks are secretive enough but the investment banks are even more secretive.

Financial writers are saying that opaque financial dealings frustrated not only them but the regulators.

The press performs a regulatory role but cannot do this if it’s blocked by institutional secrecy. Reporters don’t have subpoena powers.

All that hoopla in recent years about the SEC’s “Fair Disclosure” policies and the zillions of electronic impulses sent out at a cost of hundreds of millions of dollars via the PR wire services proved to be ineffective and mere window-dressing in the overall scheme of things.

Our experience with those electronic releases is that there’s usually no one listed at the bottom of the release who can answer questions or explain things.

This is certainly true of the five conglomerates—Omnicom, WPP, Interpublic, Publicis and Havas. They especially don’t want to talk about their combined debt of $12 billion that they ran up in buying companies. Banks allowed the congloms and others to pile up too much debt.

PR people can’t do much about the country’s financial mess but they can do something about the mess in their own trade association, the PR Society.

The signs of dysfunction at PRS are only too evident including CEO Jeff Julin asking the Presidential campaigns to sign the PRS Code of Ethics pledge when it can be shown that PRS itself is not living up to what is in the code.

There is no indication the campaigns even replied to the Aug. 22 request for them to sign a “pledge” to obey the Code.

PRS staffers refuse to take questions on this issue.

If it believed in “fairness” and the “right of free expression” for “all opinions,” as stated in the Code, PRS would carry on its website the demand of PR professors for a discussion and vote by members on the printed directory; the Central Michigan proposal for modeling PRS governance after the ABA and AMA; PDFs of transcripts of the last three Assemblies; the 2008 audit with the balance sheet shown several ways (just like we see plays in sports several ways), etc.

The latest folly of PRS leaders is printing a full page vilifying us in the September Tactics (and September is “Ethics Month” at PRS).

Now PRS leaders owe us not only money and pages of free ads in Tactics for selling our articles without our permission, but also a full page so we can rebut their false charges against us—that is if the leaders want to live up to Society’s Code.

The PRS blast, originally sent out as an e-mail to leaders April 9, refers to our role in getting Gail Baker of the University of Nebraska to resign as Ethics Board chair in March.

She had no business being named by Jeff Julin to head the most prestigious of all the 30+ PRS boards and committees because she was not even on the EB. That was a break with tradition.

She refused to answer any of our phone calls or e-mails. Previous EB head Linda Cohen had told us the national board forbade her to deal with us, proving the EB lacks needed independence and is a tool of the board. The PRS board letter accuses us of “e-mailing work associates and supervisors of a volunteer committee chair” (Baker).

We’re said to have shared our “very negative views on PRS with several of this individual’s workplace associates, questioning how the organization (Univ. of Nebraska) could want to be associated with PRS…”

It’s laughable that PRS should claim we did something wrong by going over and around Baker when she would not talk to us. It shows that the writer of the attack on us does not know much about PR.

Going over and around recalcitrant reporters and editors is a “stock-in-trade” of PR people. Reporters do the same with recalcitrant PR people.

Editors of The Oklahoman, largest daily in the state with readership of 420,000 daily, complained bitterly to the local PRS chapter Sept. 20, 2006 that chapter members called the publisher and advertiser offices on a “daily” basis to get stories used, changed or killed.

“It’s unethical, it’s wrong and too many in this town are doing it, said columnist Steve Lackmeyer, who said his financial editor, Clytie Bunyan, had ordered him to get across this complaint.

A chapter poll found that 46% of the 69 members who responded say they “have been asked by an employer or client to misrepresent, cover up, exaggerate, or withhold information from the media.”

Any “negative views” we have about PRS are backed by facts such as the copying scandal, lack of democracy (APRs have blocked non-APRs from running for national office for 30+ years), misleading financials as described by three accounting professors, etc.

Allegedly, our contacts with school officials “made it so uncomfortable that this individual (Baker) chose to withdraw from the committee (the Ethics Board) rather than take valuable time to mount a defense with all of the people O’Dwyer contacted,” says the board letter.

Baker, as head of the EB, became a public figure in the PR world and like other public figures such as Obama, McCain, Palin and Biden must face the press and public and explain herself when issues arise.

We believe that school officials told Baker to pick the school or PRS. She quit the EB less than four hours after we sent four PDFs to Chancellor John Christensen.

--Jack O'Dwyer