Code Morris: A PR Agency To Avoid

Andy Morris has been a leader in several iterations of his PR firm – although from numerous people we have spoken to he is a good salesman, but not a good Public Relations professional. His company has a very difficult time keeping clients – who often leave unhappy. And his staff? Even worse.

We must add Code Morris of the list of PR firms that Everything-PR says to stay away from.

So who is Code Morris?

Before there was a Code Morris, there was the same firm under a different name, Open Communications which had some very bad PR in 2014 – which is probably why he started a new company.

The distasteful PR in 2014 came after an employee was let go – yet he filed a complaint with the New York State Court which listed more than 100 counts of sexual harassment and discrimination from two women aimed at the Plaintiff, Joseph Jackson, including verbal, physical, and written (via texts) efforts on their part.

Jackson approached Andy Morris about the problem on more than one occasion and was told it would be looked into, but nothing was done and ultimately, less than a month after Jackson was told he was doing well at the firm and was given additional responsibility, he found himself without a job.

At some point, the company name was changed to Code Morris and on Andy’s LinkedIn page, he makes no mention of Open Communications and shows that Code Morris began after the split with his former partner in The Morris and King Company.

Prior to 2001, Morris served as Sr. VP at LaForce and Stevens and as VP at Dan Klores Communications.

Sally O’Dowd was one of the founding members of Open Communications/Code Morris but does not show any affiliation with them on her main LinkedIn page – as if she was never there. She currently serves as an Adjunct Professor at Mercy College and as founding CEO of Sally On Media, LLC, which she lists as being the case since the beginning of the Open Communications firm in 2013.

Code Morris appears to have been founded in 2013 and is a small boutique firm specializing in Tech firms and startups. Their clients include an impressive list including fiverr, Hearst Corporation, razorfish, yext, and AOL. Interestingly, they claim also to have represented Wikipedia.

And for a techie-oriented firm, they present themselves on a less-than techie level. Their website is not in the least interactive, and though it allows a visitor to link to their various social media accounts, the only other option is to look at a 21-page pdf with limited information. It also looks like it would be very difficult to add information by them to make it current.

Their Facebook company page appears a little neglected as the most recent entry was on February 29, but the one before that comes from November. Their Twitter account is a bit more active, but seems to be almost exclusively references and links to their client’s product information. For the most part, the company info can be found on their LinkedIn Page, but it’s still the bare bones.

Code Morris is a PR firm to stay away from.