Categories: News

Gorilla marketing

Press releases are the bane of a journalists life. Most of them are just plain dull. Many are so full of meritless superlatives they take an age to sub-edit down. Some have no discernible news value whatsoever.

But a tiny percentage hit home, either because they contain genuinely newsworthy stuff, or because the sender has come up with an angle or an idea that sparks your interest.

Journo-cum-PR-bod Brant Richards generally sends releases that fall into this last category. A pre-Olympics release about medal hopefuls hand-delivering Brants On-one bikes to customers during the fuel crisis landed the MBUK contributor with some mainstream media coverage.

The release below isnt likely to get the same sort of success but it shows that with a little bit of wit, imagination, and bare-faced cheek, you can turn a stupid idea into one that might pique the interest of jaded hacks.

Its the kind of story that many mags may run as a small humourous filler item.

PROVISION SPONSOR CONDORS

When Steve Joughin of top UK clothing brand Provision recently told

his marketing consultant Brant Richards of Ferret Marketing that he

wanted to sponsor Condors in the year 2001, Richards immediately set the wheels in motion.

Ferret Marketing also handle the business of etailer On-one who recently

launched their innovative sponsorship program by supporting not cyclists

but endangered species at Chester zoo.

On-One said at the time Lets face it its better to support an endangered species than a bunch of smelly cyclists.

So when Joughin received his letter from Chester Zoo congratulating him

on his support of condors he was somewhat mystified ; whilst Joughin

was hoping to sponsor the succesful London cycle dealer – Condor Cycles.