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PR pro sends dead fish to journalist

Ever get sick of journalists talking about sleazy flacks and their two-bit pitches and no-good press releases? Well, PR pro Fennimore Moorestead sure did.

Moorestead, founder of Fennimore & Moorestead, mailed a dead fish to the Time offices after a reporter at the magazine called him out at as a “PR hack” at an industry event in Manhattan last week.

It was reportedly a bluegill, which Moorestead caught himself.

The move seems to be a nod to the film, The Godfather. In the movie, a dead fish conveys that the character Luca Brasi “sleep with the fishes.” A bagman presumably delivered the fish in the Godfather; somehow Moorestead managed to send it through the U.S. mail.

So what did Moorestead mean to communicate with his fish?

Does this story stink?

Of course it stinks. It's April Fool's Day!

Comments (5)

Uh yeah. By the way, did the sender realize that in most states there is a law prohibiting the willful and wanton waste of gamefish? A simple call to the Fish and Wildlife Enforcement folks might have resulted in a citation with egg on the face after fish in the mail. Dumb.

Greg:

Rahm Emanuel actually did this!

(It's in his book, The Plan.)

In other news: http://gregpress.wordpress.com/2009/04/01/give-me-back-that-filet-o-fish-give-me-that-fish/

TJ:

So much for reading until the end. Happy April Fool's Day!?!

Paula:

OK - so it is unprofessional. But come on. Haven't you wanted to do something like this to a self-involved journalist who 1) can't be bothered to respond to your carefully researched and brief pitch or 2) and I love this - doesn't want to be contacted AT ALL by PR people! I've found that the most professional journalists give you a least 30 seconds and respond - while the think-they-are-so-great journalists can't be bothered. I guess class always shows through.

TJ:

I wouldn't call this guy a "PR Pro." He apparently earned the title of "hack" with this action. Seriously, if he were a pro would he ever tell a client, "This is what you do to improve your reputation. Catch a fish, send it to a reporter, and wait for all that goodwill to build up."?

Another step backward in media-PR relations.

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This page contains a single entry from the blog posted on April 1, 2009 8:36 AM .

The previous post in this blog was Tweet of the Day: Conficker worries spur self-evident press releases .

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