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Restaurant PR Press Releases
| For Immediate Release: 10/1/2004 |
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| CAN YOU ACHIEVE SUCCESS WITH DO-IT-YOURSELF PR? |
| Sante Magazine |
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New York, NY -
Sante Maagazine
October 2004
CAN YOU ACHIEVE SUCCESS WITH DO-IT-YOURSELF PR?
By Stephanie Crane
Over the past 30 years, America’s restaurant business has become a goliath. Here are some extra ordinary numbers, gathered by the National Restaurant Association, to support this statement: 878,000 restaurants account for $1.2 billion dollars in sales every day-well more than $400 billion annually-a jump of 1,000 percent since 1970.
This boom has not gone unnoticed by the electronic and print media; both report regularly o this huge industry and help fuel a passion among consumers for food of all kinds and the restaurants that serve the best of it. Food on TV hit the big time in 1993 with the launch of the Food Network, a 24-hour cable channel committed to exploring new and different ways to approach the subject food. Now almost every media outlet has a segment dedicated to food.
And in America, where the fascination for “personalities” appears to be boundless, the media has given the country’s foodies star chefs. They have become celebrities, hosting their own cooking shows, creating their own food brands, starring in sitcoms, and even performing on Broadway. The chef as superhero is a rocketing trend with no fizzle in site.
PR POWER
As the media becomes saturated with coverage of food, restaurants, and chefs, how can an individual establishment penetrate this arena and be heard above the babble of food-related “noise”? By developing good PR, which is no more and no less than a strategy for shaping public perception.
Good PR helps operators manage their restaurant’s reputation and enhance their profile through exposure and presents them with the opportunity to capture their fair share of the media pie. More media attention should translate into more traffic to their location and ultimately should result in more revenue.
Good PR involves many aspects of marketing, including event management and participation, relationship building with various audiences, community involvement, and truly creative use of the time you devote to your business, well beyond the standard media communication that everyone equates with public relations.
PR AND THE POCKETBOOK
Does it cost a fortune in PR to make your restaurant stand out? Is a less expensive option doomed to failure? Restaurant operators often discover that the cost of hiring a full-time agency is too great in terms of time and dollars, but there are viable, less costly alternatives. One approach is to seek out a PR company that provides you the tools and support to do it yourself, at your own pace, and at your own rate of investment. As an additional benefit at no extra cost, you may discover that staff participation in the PR process will increase their commitment to the service side of the operation.
There are PR services offered on the Internet, including those of my company, Restaurant PR, that show restaurateurs and their staff how to create their own press kit and press materials, how to work with the media, and what can be done to enhance the enterprise’s image beyond public relations. Restaurant PR and other services help you customize your message to appeal to your target audience in your specific market and screen for your most attentive and influential media contacts. Some even provide 24/7 support.
Word-of-mouth or implied endorsement, stemming from a good review, a magazine feature including or focused on your restaurant, or television coverage for your chef’s best recipe, can influence public perception and lead to a better bottom line. And there are do-it-yourself PR services out there ready to help you garner your share of media attention at a price you can afford.
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