Okay. You’re ready to take your new consumer product to market. Or, you want to energize an existing brand with programs that capture the imagination of consumers.  Perhaps you’re ready to test an untried idea on a particular audience.

Our more than 30 years in the consumer product public relations and marketing world helps us streamline the creative process. We favor ideas that work hard and get results.

Services provided:

Big Thinking, Brand Building, Community Relations, Media Relations, Advertising/Sales & Marketing Materials, Website Development, Customer Relations, Direct Marketing & Social Networking

Current Work in Food and Agriculture:

Past Work in Food and Agriculture

  • Piccolo Foods and Ciolo Foods
  • Nature’s Premium Pork
  • Meyer Natural Angus
  • Mesquite Organic Grass-fed Beef
  • Creekstone Farms Premium Beef
  • High Desert Foods
  • Coleman Natural Beef and Lamb
  • Aspen Food & Wine Classic
  • M&M/Mars
  • R.T. French
  • Storck U.S.
  • McCain Foods

CASE HISTORY: Panorama Organic Grass-Fed Beef

Wells Communications launched this product at the 2006 FMI conference with a trade-oriented media outreach campaign and a new website. Ongoing work has included a post-launch event at the Acme ChopHouse in San Francisco, outreach to high-end San Francisco and Denver chefs and ongoing consumer and trade media relations related to Panorama’s introduction at Whole Foods stores in Northern California and the Rocky Mountain region.
Results:

  • Ongoing coverage in grocery and meat industry trade publications.
  • Testimony by Panorama CEO Mack Graves before the USDA’s Food Safety and Inspection Service about “naturally raised” and “grassfed” claims for fresh meat.
  • Editorial coverage of Panorama’s various awards for environmental stewardship in regional newspapers, food blogs and natural foods trade print and online media outlets.
  • Regular updates of Panorama’s website with new rancher profiles and other content.
  • Coordination of promotional materials with Panorama’s retailer partners.
  • An Associated Press wire story that was published in many regional media outlets, video and print coverage in regional business publications and a major full-section feature story in a recent edition of the Denver Post.
  • Media outreach about Panorama ranchers and products in conjunction with Whole Foods Market stores in California and Colorado.

View results here: http://www.panoramameats.com/panorama/news/

CASE HISTORY: Coleman Natural Meats

In 1987, Coleman Natural Meats was at an important crossroads in its development. As the first producer of natural beef to go national, Coleman led the way in consumer education about hormones and antibiotics in conventional beef. We worked with Coleman to build national brand recognition, expand distribution into more than 40 new markets, align itself with federal organic labeling initiatives, support consumer trials and in-store sales in every major national market and promote the company’s leadership role in the organic food industry.

Results during this nine-year period included:

  • National media relations efforts to tell the Coleman health and taste story that resulted in more than 1,000 articles published about the company.
  • Local market media relations and special events to support new and existing markets, including Atlanta, Boston, San Francisco, Chicago, Washington, D.C., Seattle and Los Angeles
  • Arranging for Coleman to testify regularly before the USDA regarding labeling standards for natural/organic beef
  • Involvement of Coleman in every organic and specialty food organization in the U.S.
  • Support of Coleman’s trade show efforts
  • Special programs designed to deliver the “taste” message to influential food industry leaders
  • Crisis communications related to alleged tainted Coleman product in the Washington, D.C. area
  • Design and production of the sales presentation
  • Creation of point-of-sale support materials
  • Production of a Coleman video for use with financial, consumer, customer and media audiences
  • Measurement of public relations results and presentation of these results on a regular basis to company investors

CASE HISTORY: IdentiGEN North America

Since 2007, we have planned and implemented communications strategies for this bioscience company, a spinoff of the Trinity School of Genetics in Dublin, Ireland, that specializes in traceability of fresh meat using DNA. The technology is used to ensure food safety, to speed product recalls and to validate marketing claims for branded meat products. Primary customers are branded beef and pork companies in the U.S., Canada and the U.K.

Results:

  • An Associated Press article about IdentiGEN’s work with Performance Food Group to bring traceability to 11,000 U.S. restaurants. The article was published in more than 400 daily newspapers, online publications and trade journals.
  • Ongoing coverage in business and trade media outlets, including Time Magazine, USA Today, Meat & Poultry, Progressive Grocer, Western Producer (Canada), BBC and the Financial Times.
  • Outreach to various government and industry organizations with a White Paper related to the use of IdentiGEN’s technology in product recalls.
  • Creation of and maintenance of an IdentiGEN and DNA TraceBack website.

View results on IdentiGEN’s website

CASE HISTORY: Haystack Mountain Goat Dairy

We managed this Colorado artisanal goat cheese company’s successful national market rollout from 2003 through 2007. This work included outreach to food distributors, specialty food buyers at leading grocery chains, high-end chefs in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Las Vegas, Denver, Boulder, Aspen and New York City, and national and regional media outlets and bloggers and market influencers.

Here’s What Happened:

  • Established a national, first-class distributor network that is still growing today
  • Built a 30-state distribution network for Haystack Mountain cheeses in best-of-class retail outlets
  • Designed and strategized a website that works for all markets
  • Gained editorial coverage in media that included Sunset Magazine, Oprah’s O Magazine, Better Homes and Gardens, Food & Wine magazine, Saveur, regional dailies, broadcast outlets, and specialty food blogs
  • Bigger coverage: Secured feature stories about Haystack Mountain’s farm and cheeses in leading local and national food blogs
  • Boosted brand, sales and image by seeing that Haystack Mountain’s cheeses are used by celebrity chefs nationwide

View results on Haystack’s website.

CASE HISTORY: Naturally Boulder Days

This conference for natural and organic product entrepreneurs wanted to broaden its visibility in Colorado and beyond. Wells Communications managed a program of local and national media outreach that included a strong social networking component for this five-year-old conference, which took place September 2-3, 2009.

Results:

  • Coverage in Denver and Boulder news outlets, including a half-hour interview on Colorado Public Radio’s “Colorado Matters”
  • National coverage included multiple stories in Sustainable Food News and other online media outlets
  • Direct reporting on the conference by a variety of bloggers and social media publishers.