Union-Tribune Replaces Special Sections Editor
Two of the people primarily responsible for Jack in the Box, Inc.’s much-buzzed-about annual reports are at it again.
The fast-food company’s annual reports, which were designed as a comic book in 1998, a children’s book in 1999 and a competitor’s file for 2000, have gotten attention from several papers, including the Wall Street Journal.
Eric Schellhorn had been corporate communications director at Jack in the Box and left the company last year to start Crowded Room Public Relations. He also formed an alliance with designer Stephan Donche, who had been designing the reports. Donche launched his firm, Viadesign, 15 years ago.
Now, both companies work out of the same office in Old Town and plan to collaborate on annual report work.
So far, their clients besides Jack in the Box have been Girl Scouts of San Diego/Imperial Counties and Biosite Diagnostics, Inc.
Along with listing donors and sponsors, the Girl Scout report illustrates the organization’s evolution. Biosite’s report incorporates the company’s twofold goals of producing medical equipment and conducting research.
Both projects, according to Schellhorn, have been a little less extreme than what’s been done for Jack in the Box.
“There’s just no way you could make the Jack in the Box treatment work for a number of organizations,” he explained. “It wouldn’t be appropriate contextually or thematically.”
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Major Hires:
The San Diego Union-Tribune hired Chris Lavin as the newspaper’s senior editor for special sections. In the position, Lavin will be overseeing feature sections such as Currents, Arts, Night & Day, Homescape, Food, Travel, Family and Books. The Union-Tribune hired Lavin from the St. Petersburg Times in Florida, where he was assistant managing editor for world news. Before that position, he had been the Times’ editor responsible for its Sunday news features and weekly science sections. R.B. Brenner, who previously held the position in special sections, moved over to helm the business and sports sections 10 months ago. Longtime local media personality Geni Cavitt, who has been the morning and noontime weather and traffic anchor at KFMB-TV Channel 8, is now handling weekend weather anchor duties at KGTV Channel 10. Cavitt is replacing Mike Ambrose, who retired April 30. Cavitt’s first show on KGTV was May 5.
Sound Bites:
The Museum of Art’s “Take A Closer Look” pamphlet, designed by local freelance artist Aaron Angel for the institution’s 75th anniversary, won an honorable mention from the American Association of Museums’ annual publications design competition. With an average of $152 for Web pledges and $145 for pledges in general, KPBS-TV raised $542,877 during its 23-day spring 2001 membership campaign. “And you said we sucked!” is the headline for an opinion story that details some recent recognition from the California Intercollegiate Press Association for SDSU college paper The Daily Aztec. Along with winning 29 awards, more than any other college paper, the Aztec took home the prestigious sweepstakes. SDSU hosted the annual conference last month. Locally based advertising firm Castle & Associates recently found out that it is one of this year’s winners of the Telly Awards for cable and non-network television commercials. Although organizers of the awards are informing winners, they aren’t formally announcing them for a couple of weeks. Castle won a bronze award for a 60-second spot called “Gadget” within its “What’s driving you?” campaign for Car Country Carlsbad.
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Status Chart:
Downtown-based Tyler Blik Design signed to develop a corporate theme and define marketing strategy for locally based Mitchell Repair, which produces car repair and related information materials. The Townsend Agency recently hired Ashish Gupta as executive vice president for strategic marketing. Before Townsend, Gupta had been vice president of business strategy at e-service firm Rare Medium Inc. May 1 was Deanna Spehn’s first day as a director in Stoorza Communications’ local public affairs office. Most recently, Spehn had an unsuccessful run for the 7th District seat on the San Diego City Council. She had been senior policy analyst for former mayor Susan Golding for three years, and during the transition to Mayor Dick Murphy. Before that, she worked with former councilwoman Judy McCarty. Spehn will also continue on as co-publisher of Tierrasanta community paper The Tierra Times, which she co-founded in 1977. She works on the paper every other Saturday. There’s no conflict of interest, she said: The Times is strictly focused on community issues.
The deadline for the next Media & Marketing column is May 10. Rodrigues can be reached at (858) 277-6359, Ext. 107, or via e-mail at trodrigues@sdbj.com.
