Public Relations Today

Was it Buddha who said, “invite your enemies into your living room?”  The Buddha’s teachings are so vast, it’s hard to remember, but the principal holds firm.  It’s amazing where we can pick up knowledge, even from competitors and foes, maybe even more so from these.

Some years ago and for many years, Primavera Public Relations was the agency of record for Ruth’s Chris Steak House when Ruth Fertel was still at the helm.  I loved Ruth like a mother and would do anything for her.  At the time, she felt that an adversary named Dale Wamstead who created the original Del Frisco’s Steakhouse was adversely affecting her chain’s reputation.  In a very clever way (I was later quoted on national television as saying it was “diabolically” clever), he had created a phony steak house rating system called the “Knife & Fork Club” that listed the top steak houses in the country and published ads in the airline publications announcing the list.  He intentionally left out Ruth’s Chris which was his main competitor in his original
Texas market.  “Please do something about this,” Ruth asked.

What I did, innocently enough, was write an article in the Ruth’s Chris newsletter, “The Steak House Gang,” called “When It Comes to Restaurant Rating Systems, Whom Can You Trust?” which rated the review systems available at that time, listing them according to credibility.  Considering that the “Knife and Fork Club” was created by Wamstead’s public relations man, it got a low ranking, along with some exposition of the hoax.

While we all expected Wamstead to react negatively, perhaps as strongly as Ruth did to his review system, we didn’t expect two $5 million lawsuits, one against Ruth’s Chris and one against Primavera Public Relations.

The discovery sessions for the lawsuit were brutal.  I’m a laid-back guy, but my hackles were really elevated by the opposition’s lawyers.  Interestingly, Wamstead and I were at the same table as were the lawyers, and we seemed to connect in some way. At one point, the lawyers recessed for some private talk, and Wamstead and I were left alone in the room.  He looked at me and said, “I respect your work, and I’m really sorry for all of this.”  I looked at him and said, “You seem to know things about marketing that I never thought of, and I’ve been in the business all my professional life.” To this, he responded, “Well, I learned everything I know from the Guerilla Marketing books.”  These are books that, to this point, I had not explored, but based on the recommendation of my “foe,” I learned about something I had been missing, something that has benefited my clients since.

My point today is twofold: We never know where or how we’re going to get valuable information AND never has there been a greater need or opportunity for Guerilla Marketing in the marketplace as there is today. While Primavera Public Relations is a generalist agency, we specialize in lifestyles accounts:  restaurants, hotels, food and wine and real estate developments.  Capturing the customer away from competitors in rough economic times, especially in these fields, requires the kind of marketing warfare that we might not normally employ under normal conditions.

In the weeks ahead, I’ll be sharing some of the techniques we’re employing for our clients.  For now, you might want to visit: http://www.gmarketing.com/

Talk soon!