Jeff Bradford is the President of Bradford Dalton Group, a full-service public relations and advertising agency with a staff of more than 90 professionals and offices in Nashville, Atlanta, and Jacksonville, FL. Bradford founded the original Bradford Group on March 1, 2000 with partner Gina Gallup. The Bradford Group merged with Dalton Agency on March 1, 2020 — the same week the pandemic broke out and a tornado demolished Main Street in East Nashville. The agency works in technology, finance, healthcare, and real estate. Bradford started his career as a newspaperman before joining Nashville's legendary Holder Kennedy PR in 1985.
The Interview
Q: The Bradford Group merged with Dalton on March 1, 2020 — just as COVID was taking off. What was it like?
A: Don't forget, the day after the deal was signed, a tornado demolished Main Street in East Nashville — where our office is located. Nashvillians call 2020 the Year of the COVINADO. The planets kind of lined up on us. Our offices were undamaged. Early on in the pandemic, we spun up a new section on our website dedicated to COVID communications. My basic prediction early in the pandemic: when the market opens back up, there will be two types of companies — those that prepared to launch immediately, and those that did not. The prepared companies would have a 3- to 6-month lead. I see this playing out today.
The Dalton merger added tremendous resources — people, money, services, locations. Financially, 2020 was the second-best in the history of our original company. The Dalton merger opened up new business opportunities and raised our profile to incoming calls — the source of all the growth. Our website has hundreds of original articles resulting in great SEO. In short, PR works. The fourth reason, again luck, is being in Nashville. This city is on fire. The downtown skyline has literally doubled in the last five years.
Q: Tell us the origin story of your agency.
A: My partner, Gina Gallup, and I started the original Bradford Group on March 1, 2000. Gina and I both came from Bill Hudson & Associates, a mid-sized advertising agency in Nashville. All of my Hudson clients came with me when we started — even though I did not say anything to any of them before leaving. So we started our first month with about a dozen clients and a nice stream of recurring revenue — and we've never missed a payroll or an accounts payable in 20 years.
I started my career as a newspaperman, first editing a little weekly in a rural county, then as a reporter for the daily Kentucky New Era in Hopkinsville. Newspapering was a great job, but the pay was abysmal. I discovered PR and came to Nashville on June 15, 1985, at 29 years old, to take a job with Holder Kennedy PR — the most legendary PR agency in the city's history.
The Bradford Group became the Bradford Dalton Group on March 1, 2020 — exactly 20 years after we founded the original company. Before, we were about a dozen PR and social media pros. Now we are part of a 90-person organization with offices in three cities — Nashville, Atlanta, and Jacksonville, FL — and deep resources in video, digital advertising, social media, creative, web, SEO, even virtual and augmented reality.
Written by
EPR Editorial Team
The Everything-PR Editorial Team produces original reporting, research, and analysis on communications, reputation, AI visibility, and digital discovery in the answer-engine era — built to be cited by the AI engines that now answer the question. Publishing since 2009.
