I rush around the State of Maine in my car so much of the time that I rarely stop to admire the view.  However I typically have a camera with me because I take photos of press conferences and other special events for my clients.

So I was walking out of the Orange Cat Cafe in Kingfield a couple weeks ago, and looked out over the field toward the Carrabassett River, and saw this amazing view. Thank goodness I had my camera in my back seat. I snapped a photo so I could remember how beautiful that full moon was on that January afternoon.

The old saying goes: “Take time to smell the roses.”  Well the roses weren’t in bloom in Kingfield on this January afternoon, but the full moon sure was!

There’s an article in the new issue of  ”Mountain News”  by ski writer Roger Leo about Chip Carey,  who recently was hired to head up Marketing at Jackson Hole Resort in Wyoming.  I had the privilege of working for Chip at Sugarloaf in the Communications Department from 1984 to1991, then when I started my agency, he was my client for most of the 1990’s.

There is no question that Chip is a great PR man.  As Roger Leo writes in the article, he has always been ahead of the curve on technology and he considers that “the medium is the message.”  He bought one of the first fax machines in 1971 and he was responsible for creating the first website in the ski industry in the 1980s. He also started the closed circuit cable TV station that is still broadcasting at Sugarloaf and has grown into the Resort Sports Network which is now a national broadcasting and marketing company. Continue Reading »

Today I helped coordinate a media event at my client Skowhegan Savings’ location in Madison, Maine. Army Sgt. Eric Pierce, a 27 year old from Embden, Maine introduced his dog Sandy to people who had helped provide the money for him to bring the dog back from Afghanistan.

This is a photo of Sgt. Pierce with his sister Christine, her daughter Abby, and Sandy the dog. Christine volunteers for an organization called Lucky Pup of Kennebunk. She is a ‘foster mom’ for puppies. Lucky Pup is one of the beneficiaries of the extra funds raised for Sandy.

About a year ago, Sgt. Pierce and his army mates found Sandy and his litter mates near Kabul. Pierce says that after fighting all day, it was comforting for the troops to come back to their base camp and have a dog to play with and care for. But there are evidently lots of stray dogs over there so army officials ordered Pierce and the soldiers in his unit to dispose of, or actually to shoot the dogs. They couldn’t bring themselves to do that, so they brought the dogs out in the wilderness and dropped them off. But the dogs came back. At that point, Pierce became so attached to Sandy, he called his mom Maddy back in Maine and asked if she could help him raise the $2900 to bring the dog home. So Maddy put the word out to the local community. Reporter Doug Harlow from the Central Maine Morning Sentinel wrote a story about it which ended up getting picked up in newspapers statewide. Continue Reading »

 One of the important things I learned early in my PR career was the power of great photographs. My PR mentor, Chip Carey, taught me to always try to include a photograph with a press release for the media. Sometimes that slowed me down (and those of you who know me know that I don’t like to be slowed down at work!), because I had to look around for a good photo, and back in the day, I had to make duplicates (sometimes by myself  in our own darkroom!….talk about time consuming!)

I am now more convinced than ever that a great shot adds enormously to a press release. Sometimes, particularly in dealing with travel editors, having a great image means the difference between a cover story in the travel section or being buried in the back of the section. Or sometimes it means your story being placed above the fold rather than below the fold. And obviously when dealing with television news, they need great video. When pitching a story to a TV news editor it’s important to describe what the visual images will look like.  TV people thrive on images, not on words alone. Continue Reading »

Seems that everyone I know who has an iPhone is fanatical about it. I don’t have one because I use U.S. Cellular and they don’t offer them (note to self: ask my friend Jim Holmes at U.S. Cellular if and when they will offer iPhones.)

This is a photo of my friend Michael Stumpf who owns Stumpf and Associates from Doylestown, Pennsylvania taking a photo last Friday night on Fisherman’s Wharf in Monterey before we went in to have dinner at Domenico’s on the Wharf. The calamari appetizer there was unbelievable, as were the fresh California artichokes. Continue Reading »

I took these photos along the shoreline near Pebble Beach last Thursday before my bike ‘encounter’ with the door of a Mercedes Benz. Not sure how the door fared, but I was pretty shook up and bruised (and still am!)  I was in too much of a daze after it happened to see if the door was damaged or not. At least that’s replaceable but my head is not!

Regardless, Monterey is a beautiful part of the country and it was a beautiful setting to learn about social media from Brett Giles and Andrew Bagley out of Sitewire in Tempe, Arizona.  They work on all aspects of search marketing for national clients like Olive Garden and Red Lobster. This field of social media and search marketing is evolving so quickly and there are so many different ways of getting involved with it that I find it extremely stimulating and fun. Continue Reading »

I’ve been away from my blog for over a week…shame on me. I do have an excuse, however. I’ve been playing with my new toys.

First of all, I ordered a new iPod. My old one was nice, but it was full and had no more hard drive space for me to download podcasts. My new one is the new pink Nano, with 8 Gigs of space for all my stuff. I’ve grown to really love listening to podcasts. My favorite is FIR, which stands for For Immediate Release, is all about PR and social media. The hosts are Shel Holtz and Neville Hobson. Continue Reading »

The Maine Built Boats organization gathered at the Portland Museum of Art on Saturday night to celebrate the launch of its new branding campaign. It has been my pleasure to be involved with a group of talented boat builders as well as the creative people who have put this campaign together. Continue Reading »

Last Monday, I was in New York with the team from Maine’s Office of Tourism for the annual Taste of Maine Media Marketplace.

 John and Brendan Ready, aka the “Ready Brothers” were along as one of the tourism “PR Partners” with a table at the marketplace.

Here are two of the finest kind of Maine ‘boys.’ And they have a new take on an old Maine business. The Ready’s recently started “Catch a Piece of Maine.” They are selling lobster traps as if they were time shares. You can buy one of their traps for $2,995 a year and get all the lobsters that are caught in the trip delivered to you, along with all the fixings to make a real Maine lobster dinner. If you don’t want the lobsters delivered to you, they will deliver them to a family member, a client, or a friend. Not only that, but you can get to know the lobsterman who tends to your trap. He will send you emails and videos of the conditions, of his boat, and of the lobsters as he catches them. Imagine having a lobster bake in Milwaukee, Missoula, or Monterey, and watching a video of the lobsterman in Casco Bay, as you cook the lobsters and clams from Maine.

In this day and age when people want to know more about where their food comes from, this is a brilliant idea.  They plan to engage in Social Media to sell lobsters. Who woulda thought?  This is a great way to ‘ Catch a Piece of Maine.’ 

Today was a beautiful day for my son Jamie’s ski race at Sugarloaf on Competition Hill. I talked with Lee and Holly Thibodeau from Cold River Vodka.  They are a client of NMC. We helped launch their brand in 2005 and 2006. At Christmastime in 2006 we sent a sample bottle to Gourmet Magazine. The staff tasted it during their holiday party. The result appeared this week in Gourmet’s e-newsletter. Another PR result for Cold River Vodka is in this month’s Oprah Magazine, which resulted from a pitch I made at last year’s Maine Media Marketplace event in Manhattan. These two results in monthly magazines are examples of the long-term nature of Media Relations. Sometimes you make a pitch and nothing happens for a year or two. But the results are worth waiting for! 

I also talked to Jen McCormack, my good friend who lives in Carrabassett and works for the Franklin Community Health Network in Farmington.  She and her husband Jim also own Mountain View Cottages in Rangeley. She always counts on me for a good laugh. She and I were laughing and someone near us had a two-way radio which picked up the melodious tones of our joyous laughing sounds. Her husband heard us and called her cell phone to tell her to quiet down.  Oh well, some people just don’t get it that it’s healthy to have a good belly laugh once in a while. Actually every day is a good idea!Speaking of Sugarloaf and ski racing, Bode Miller raced here while attending Carrabassett Valley Academy. Bode recently started a social networking site for skiers called SkiSpace.  Since I’m an avid skier, I’ve just created a profile on SkiSpace. We’ll see where it goes.