How retailers can achieve good PR coverage Essay

How retailers can achieve good PR coverage - Essay Example To communicate and relay any important information about the company to the consumers, retailers rely on a host of techniques which are collectively referred to as public relations. Good public relations improve the retailer’s bottom line. On the other hand, poor public relations are known to retard the growth of the company or worse still, lead to heavy losses (Wood 2012). These techniques range from traditional ones such as discounts, to modern ones such as environmental sensibility. The perfect mix in this broad range is not well known, but some basic tenets underline these chaos. The United Kingdom is known as the principal retail location with such brands that are recognized world wide. For example, Tesco, Asda, Morrison’s, Marks and Spencer, Next, Dixons, just to mention but a few. These retailers alongside many others account for 8% of the islands G.D.P. To be specific, the city of London is a huge retail capital with a large spending ahead of other big cities li ke Tokyo, New York and Paris. These U.Ks largest retail brands have to apply the full range of tools and techniques, so as to secure good public standing. This range of public relations measures shall form the core of this paper. Finer analysis specific cases shall be conducted. The qualitative and quantitative benefits that derive from each shall also be evaluated. Finally, valuable lessons for new retailers shall be inferred. Most of the public news used as case studies for this paper shall be gleaned from The Guardian. This is because it is an authoritative and widely read broadsheet. Readers both within the U.K and without, rely on it for their news. Also important shall be The Telegraph. The mode of presenting the information shall be in a form akin to the case study. A retailer recently covered in the news shall be identified. The nature of coverage received shall be evaluated i.e negative or positive. The impact that the publicity had shall be discussed. At the end, a lesson for new retailers shall be contained. The first study is that of a retailer called Neal Yard. Neal Yard is a natural and organic beauty products retailer. On the 26th of May 2009 they agreed to take part in a segment in The Guardian, called â€Å"You Ask, They Answer†. The underlying objective was for the wider public and customers in particular to question the retailer and in turn get back answers to their question. As it happens with all companies, vociferous critics questioned the company’s ethical and green claims. The company was, however, unable to face up to the criticism. Instead, it pulled out of the debate without due notification to the public. No additional questions were taken. Despite constant prodding from The Guardian to respond to the questions or at least make a commitment to do so later, Neal Yard was non-committal. As a result, the questions surrounding their removal of a homeopathic malaria medication remain. This interest attracted much big newspa pers and even blogs. The reason simply is that the company employed poor P.R techniques (Adam 2009). This leads to one of the cardinal rules of publicity for businesses. That is, they should always respond to customers concerns. It matters less whether they make a lot of sense or not. It is easy for companies to bury their heads in the sand and