The Newsletter for Clients of
WESTCOUNTRY PR SERVICES January 2008

E-Shape of things to come?
TALKING of things modern and futuristic (front page), I was intrigued by this report in the Media Guardian:
It won’t be long before buying a copy of Heat or the Economist at your local newsagent could become as niche an activity as buying a vinyl LP. Instead of leisurely flicking through a magazine on the sofa with a cup of tea, you will read it on the web, download it onto a piece of e-paper or simply publish it yourself.
According to David Renard, author of The Last Magazine, in the next 25 years only 10% of the European and American paper-based magazine industry will remain, kept alive by “connoisseurs, aficionados and ageing Luddites.” The rest of us will embrace the publishing revolution.
Instead of nipping to the newsagent, you will download the day’s news, sport or City pages from a vending machine and read it on a piece of e-paper. And when you finish, you’ll put the e-paper in your briefcase and update the content the next day.
According to Mike Nelson, Fujitsu’s European general manager, e-paper is “exceptionally useful.” “It looks like colour newsprint, it is tough, flexible, very thick and you could change the image on it every two seconds for a year using a triple-A battery,” he says.

OW-CH – What a line
MY FAVOURITE headline of the year for a WPRS client was BIG ROW PARTS CLOSE COLLEAGUES!
BETCHA pronounced it row as in cow! What it actually referred to was an upcoming sponsored row – as in low – across the Atlantic Ocean by Wombwell Homes contracts manager Steve Gardner, who would be away for two months after working closely with boss John Wombwell for 15 years!

Thank you, busy bees
A BIG THANK-YOU to all those of you who kept me busy during 2007 after my decision to lighten my load by substantially reducing my client base and putting myself onto a four-day working week.
(“Are you mad?” I was asked once or twice. Well, maybe yes, but it has proved one of the best decisions I ever made.)
Apart from the property regulars and hyper-active Steve Skinner at Skinners Brewery, I was kept constantly on my toes by two particularly enthusiastic young marketing managers – Eli Barbary, of the Falmouth Beach Resort Hotel, and Jakki Eyre, of Newquay-based Talling Construction.
Enthusiasm is a fine thing, and just occasionally I found it very hard to exercise caution where PR ideas were in my opinion border-line at best.
A reminder, then, that if I don’t always agree with an idea it’s not because I’m no longer hungry! It’s just that, in the best longer-term interests of all my clients, I have always got results as much as anything by maintaining a reputation for only submitting strong candidates for publication. So I am never keen to risk lowering the standard by proceeding with a press release that I rate as less than 60-40.

Now is the time
CAN I also remind you that now – the first six weeks of the New Year – is by far the best time of the whole year to be issuing a press release. Acres of space to fill – with precious little news about!

Surfing superstar
ONE of my main tasks in 2008 is to raise the profile of surfing superstar Ben Skinner, European longboard champion and world No. 2.
“There’s nothing quite like surfing and only a surfer really knows the feeling,” he says. “There are no rules, only etiquette, and you and the surf. You forget about everything else and it feels like being as close to nature as you can possibly get.
“When you think about it, a wave has been born in a storm way out in the Atlantic and it has travelled thousands of miles to eventually hit the beach. That’s the end of its life – and I have surfed its last legs, its dying moments!”

Steve's catch-up day
I WAS struck by just how interested Steve Skinner, of Skinners Brewery, appeared to be when I was telling him about my changed working arrangements - which include keeping Thursdays clear of meetings, whenever possible, for “catching up” with the outstanding workload.
Sure enough, at our next meeting, he asked me how it was all going and then turned triumphantly to his own diary and showed me his Friday entry – which had no appointments but just a couple of lines through it and the words CATCH-UP DAY!
Great stuff, Steve. Next stop, four-day week for you, too (as if!).

PR SUCCESS is published by Westcountry PR Services Ltd,
8 Grovehill Drive, Falmouth, Cornwall TR11 3HS.
Tel: 01326 317147
Fax: 01326 211460
Email: mike@wprs.co.uk

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