Steve Says

Did you happen to catch the story this week on the Batman Cake Hoax gone bad?  I mean REAL bad.

A PR firm in San Antonio thought everyone was on board with their publicity stunt to attract movie watchers to the opening of the new Batman film.  Part of the pitch?  Deliver cakes to every radio and TV station in town along with instructions to call a phone number. 

You dial the number and the cake starts "ringing" (actually the phone buried in the cake rings).  It was enough to call out the bomb squad to one TV station that 'didn't-get-the-message' so to speak.

Here's the story in case you missed it:

It got me thinking about all of the crazy things that show up on my desk each week from PR firms and manufacturers who are trying to get their product some publicity on TV.  Some are simple.  Some are very creative. SOME ARE OUTRAGEOUS!  Some of the stuff you are about to see would NEVER make it into a TV segment (others would), but the pitches from those that represent the products were memorable enough to at least grab my attention and make it into my blog.  These PR folks stood out enough that I thought their pitches shouldn't be kept a secret.

(What you can't hear when I open the Batman-themed box is a pre-recorded message from the Joker which automatically plays when the box is opened.  We tried again, but my mic didn't pick it up.)

Click play to see what I'm talking about:

You might be wondering, what happens to all of this stuff?  at the end of each year I hold a free raffle for everyone who works in the building and it is all given away.  You'd be AMAZED at some of the junk people can't wait to "sign up" to "win".