Ayers PR Clients Start to Make Moves

The shake-out from Sydney Ayers’ decision to leave her own firm to take the MD job at Arment Dietrich’s new Denver office appears to have started. Floor-care company BonaKemi USA has left Ayers PR after approximately eight months and selected LeGrand Hart as its agency. LeGrand Hart seems like a natural fit because it previously rep’ed Orange Glo, but curiously it appears based on its Web site that most of the team members who worked on the agency’s Orange Glo account have since left the firm.

Bronson Hilliard

Sure, life was tough for CU-Boulder spokesman Bronson Hilliard when Buffalo Chip decided to go gangsta, but let’s all take a moment to appreciate that we don’t have his job today. Among his current challenges:

  • 10 CU fraternity pledges were arrested after trashing a Super 8 Motel in Estes Park.
  • A staff editor at the CU Campus Press authored a column headlined “If It’s War the Asians Want … It’s War They’ll Get” stating that all Asians hate whites and that “it’s time we start hating them back.”
  • The CU-Boulder campus has split over the selection of oil mogul Bruce Benson as the president of the CU System. 

Gawker vs. Edelman

Sadly, the Gawker vs. Edelman catfight seems to be petering out. Gawker started the fireworks by accusing Edelman of telling new employees that as flacks “sometimes you just have to stand up there and lie.” That hardly seemed in the spirit of CEO Richard Edelman’s public comments on the importance of transparency, but Edelman also pimps Wal-Mart, so it’s hard to tell who is telling the truth.  

Golly Gee, We’ll Show Them Some Real Denver Spirit

The Denver Business Journal covers the activities that the “seasoned” Sharon Linhart and her downtown Denver task force have planned for the 1952 2008 Democratic National Convention in late August. Among them:

  • An “original orchestral score is being composed and will be performed by an orchestra from Denver.”
  • An event called Artocracy, “in which people will stand in a central spot downtown and read portions of the United States Constitution, Bill of Rights or Declaration of Independence.”
  • A four-minute commemorative film “to show faces and places downtown.”

Coors PR: Umm … Pete’s ‘Chairman’ Title is Largely Ceremonial

Pete Coors has the public relations departments at both Coors and Miller working overtime to distance the companies from his claim that neither Denver nor Milwaukee will be considered for the headquarters of the soon-to-be MillerCoors. Reportedly, Dallas and Chicago are the frontrunners (deja vu of the United and Boeing searches for new headquarters), but both Denver and Milwaukee have vowed to fight for it.    

Denver Newspaper Defections Expand Beyond Reporting Ranks

To date, the mass exodus from the Rocky Mountain News and the Denver Post has largely been limited to reporters, but the departures continue and now include titles such as Web developer. It’s bad enough to lose reporters to PR firms, but when you begin losing your staff to the likes of photobucket.com, it is clear that the challenges facing newspapers are unlike anything they’ve faced before. 

Denver Named Fourth ‘Greediest’ City

Forbes has crunched the numbers and calculates that Denver is the fourth greediest city in the nation. A look at the formula, however, shows that “greedy” is more of a Forbes marketing gimmick than a realistic representation of the cities mentioned. To identify the “greediest” cities, Forbes calculated the number of Forbes 400 members per 100,000 residents. Denver landed behind San Jose, San Francisco and Seattle. 

A Few Other Denver PR Wins

  • GroundFloor Media announced it won the VICORP Restaurants (Village Inn and Baker’s Square) account.
  • ProConnect announced it won the Unity Business Networks and Innovative Sound Solutions accounts.
  • InterPro announced it won the Metro Denver Automobile Dealers Association and 2008 Denver International Auto Show accounts.