legal

Steve Cody & Ed Moed are best known for co-founding Peppercomm, a communications and public relations company based in New York City. They have two other branches in San Francisco and London. The firm started in 1995, and rely on an improvisational comedy culture to help allure and attract not only employees but clients as well. They have roughly 100 employees working in their New York City, San Francisco, and London offices, but in recent years their sluggish business growth has seen a decrease in employee morale, and client output. The firm started with the mission to listen to the... Read More >

Two Houston attorneys, Michael Pohl, individually and d/b/a the Law Office of Michael Pohl, and Jimmy Williamson, d/b/a Jimmy Williamson P.C. partnered together to solicit businesses and individuals to become their clients to file claims against BP PLC over the 2010 oil spill. To that end, they retained the services of various PR experts, including Scott Walker, Steve Seymour, Kirk Ladner, and Precision Marketing Group. The attorneys made an agreement with the PR experts to pay them $1,500 an hour for 10 hours of work a day, seven days a week. According to the suit, the attorneys paid only a... Read More >

We went looking at some of the top PR firms and their *retirement benefit packages – with the help of Brightscope, a financial company which provides services for retirement planning.  Brightscope ranks 401k & retirement plans, and wanted to compare the plans of some of America’s leading Public Relations agencies. While many agencies information was not available, many were – and among the large PR firms we could find: APCO Worldwide and Edelman had the best 401K plans – and MWW PR Group and DKC (Dan Klores Communications) had the worst. Note that 401k’s, have differences, so comparing these PR companies’... Read More >

On September 25th Floyd Mayweather, Sr. filed a lawsuit against Ann Barlow and Tim Chan, both residents of Clark County, Nevada, in the Clark County District Court. According to the complaint filed by Mr. Mayweather, he contracted with the two individuals for their help in establishing a non-profit organization to "knock out" sarcoidosis and other preventable brain injuries. Mr. Mayweather – father of champ fighter Floyd - suffers from the condition as do many professional fighters. And despite rumors to the contrary, as Steve Cody, CEO of Peppercomm confirmed, the Ann Barlow in question is decidedly not the Ann Barlow... Read More >

MDC Partners has had its problems. Its shares dropped dramatically this past April after news that the SEC was launching an investigation into the CEO of MDC Partners Miles Nadal. Then shares plummeted after receiving a subpoena from the Securities and Exchange Commission. The SEC requested documents “relating to CEO expenses, the company’s goodwill and other accounting practices, as well as trading in the company’s securities by third parties.” Following this, Nadal agreed to pay back the company $8.6 million for reimbursed medical expenses, travel and commuting costs, charitable and other unspecified expenses. Things have been rocky. Corporate Re-branding Efforts and... Read More >

If you don’t know this story, here’s the basics. Samy and Amy Bouzagio appeared on Gordon Ramsay’s Kitchen Nightmare (aired May 10, 2013). They were the owners of Amy’s Bakery in Scottsdale, Arizona. This episode was notable because it was the first time in the series’ history Ramsay was unable to finish the transformation and then the social media nightmare (possibly a sequel series in the future) ensued. People posted their thoughts about the couple and their restaurant. Claims were made of excessively bad behavior and verbal abuse of customers by the pair. Their food was called into question though... Read More >

  In early 2014, PR Week reported former staffers at Strawberry Frog Amsterdam’s office sued the agency’s parent, APCO Worldwide. The suit claimed APCO guaranteed payments for at least three years – yet closed the office well before the three years had passed. The suit was dismissed as the defunct Strawberry Frog Amsterdam (now going by the name Dutch Advertising Consortium) filed for bankruptcy status in the Dutch courts, and it was granted. This left contractors with no way of getting paid what the firm owed them. Employees can recover all or part of their lost wages through Dutch unemployment... Read More >

In the Public Relations Industry it is always important to know the companies behind the PR firms. Everything PR has highlighted the Profits and Losses of 4 large Holding Companies that own one or more PR Firms, and have recently reported their profit / loss statements. Here is what they report. Profits and losses of Text 100 During 2014 Text 100 had 13.7% global revenue growth and 20% in the US. Annual profit margins were even better at 16% and 33.8% respectively. Since the financial report given the end of April 2015, the company has been acquiring several new interests all... Read More >

Steven Hall is a founding partner and managing director of Steven Hall & Partners (SH&P). Hall has 35 plus years of experience and expertise in advising upper echelon corporate managers on the best strategies for the planning and implementation of senior executive compensation programs and incentive packages. Hall’s expertise gives the firm an overall independent perspective, giving it the edge as one of the most influential agencies in corporate governance and the boardroom. Since its establishment in 2005, SH&P has become a nationally recognized firm in the industry having locations in New York City and Palo Alto, California. The agency... Read More >

Now an airline is catching heat on a federal level. Delta Air Lines was recently in federal court, where a judge ordered the company to cough up $2.7 million for failing to produce information in a lawsuit related to baggage fees. This order was ON TOP OF another $4.8 million in penalties previously handed down. According to the judge, Delta dragged their feet, taking far too long to produce the emails and allow them to be entered into evidence. US District Court Judge Timothy Batten blamed Delta’s “ineptitude and missteps” for unacceptable delays. “Ineptitude” is not the word consumers want... Read More >