Canuckflack

• A Google Maps guide to driving between Santa Claus, Indiana and Christmas, Florida.
• AKQA’s neon hamster wheel (which apparently isn’t sh*t)
• Frank Best’s greeting card for failed cold calls (you want to read this)
• IStudio’s Do Not Want ads.
• McKinney’s SnowGlobe Boy (staffer lived in an inflatable globe in the lobby)
• Dave mentioned the greeting from Twist Image
• Kate has built a comprehensive list of online Christmas cards (here, here, and here)

Merry Christmas to you all!

Technorati Tags: Christmas cards, advertising agency

The BBC is rolling with news that cutbacks and layoffs are imminent, and significant television and radio personalities are speaking out about the impact on the hallowed institution.

The BBC is criticized for its split personality: a world class news gathering organization, and a melange of popular television and radio channels. Canada has a similar national network, albeit funded in part by commercial advertising.

In a moment of intense media scrutiny, a spokesperson can find himself fielding questions and interview requests from three different media (radio, television and internet) and five or more provinces - but all from the same network, the CBC.

Sort of like what the head of the BBC is experiencing:

“…In a particularly convenient moment of irony, BBC director general Mark Thompson notes that, after announcing the restructuring, he received 37 separate interview requests from various BBC news outlets.” (Toronto Star)

Technorati Tags: BBC, CBC, spokesperson, integrated newsroom, multi channel universe

Thanks to Google News, your spokesperson or technical expert may have another opportunity to present their case in the news - AFTER the journalist has filed.

Google’s about to add a comment feature to Google News - but with a twist. Only people directly involved with the story, like those quoted in it, can submit a comment to be moderated by the Google News staff.

“We’ll be trying out a mechanism for publishing comments from a special subset of readers: those people or organizations who were actual participants in the story in question. Our long-term vision is that any participant will be able to send in their comments, and we’ll show them next to the articles about the story. Comments will be published in full, without any edits, but marked as “comments” so readers know it’s the individual’s perspective, rather than part of a journalist’s report.”(Google News Blog)

This signals another shift toward the corporate interpretation of how social media should be managed.

For those of you following on the home game, the comments appended to a Google News story will have gone through TWO filters - the original reporter’s judgement of who should participate in the story, and Google’s own test of authenticity.

How about that? You can just throw the egalitarian nature of comments under the bus now. Traditional media, as interpreted and annotated by the gatekeepers.

For public relations specialists, this opens up a whole new channel of communication: pointing readers to your evidence and your record of the interview.

Especially for you paranoid and obsessive types that make it a habit of recording every moment your senior executive comes within a restraining order of a journalist.

And, judging from the FAQ on the new comments policy, your comments may have greater longevity than the story itself:

“However, we’ll try to be in touch with you and possibly include your comments in future stories that mention you. “

Communicators and media relations experts now have another channel to consider when evaluating the impact of their media coverage.

Why not respond to how your interview, fact sheet or news release were interpreted in the article?

Technorati Tags: Google News, comment policy, retaliation

After nearly six years, I’m back to being an official spokesperson. And I like it. The back room’s a fine place to work, but I also like speaking to researchers, reporters, clients and Canadians in general.

There’s a sense of personal accountability and professional pride that comes with actually explaining and debating your organization’s programs and policies.

In some fashion, the change in jobs has prompted an adrenaline rush, like Hunter S. Thompson’s jackrabbits.

Oh - and there’s the google juice too. Your personal and professional profile benefits from the online media coverage. - unless you really screw up.

That’s one thing that’s changed since we were partying like it was 1999.

Technorati Tags: spokesperson, online media relations

Famed singer Anne Murray has waded into the debate over building a wind turbine farm in Nova Scotia’s Gulf Shore. And she’s chosen some strange points to support her argument.

While interest in alternative sources of energy has built up steam over the last year, there is a much longer history of opposition to industrial wind farms in areas of North Carolina, Long Island, and off Nantucket.

The media lines normally wielded by community groups opposing wind farms are well tested:

• impact on migratory birds
• effects on sensitive water, hilltop or plains environment
• impact on shipping lanes or fishing rights
• lack of proper consultation by municipal, regional or higher levels of government
• uneven understanding of water rights held by property owners

Nowhere in that list can you find:

• degradation of views available to golfers
• proximity to “dream homes”

Which are the principal arguments wielded by the Snowbird Songstress in her op/ed published in the Halifax Chronicle Herald today.

“…I have played golf all over the world and Northumberland Links ranks with the best of them. Its seaside location and excellent reputation attract golfers from everywhere and we need those golfers to help us sustain the Links. I have played on two golf courses that had turbines nearby and I would never play them again. They are imposing structures and definitely not the kind of thing one wants to see from a golf course. I believe that others would feel the same as I and never return. Turbines are a curiosity, but only once.” (Halifax Chronicle Herald)

But I really have to question an argument against wind farms that concentrates on their visual impact on recreational activities - whether it’s cottaging or golfing.

That’s just bad messaging.

*And I have to recommend that Snowbird Songtress link up there - the video is old school*

Technorati Tags: Snowbird, Anne Murray, wind farm, wind turbine, Gulf Shore, wind energy, NIMBY

If I haven’t mentioned this lately, I’ve moved some of my public relations posts over to sosaidthe.org - my site dedicated to improving government communications.

Lately, I’ve written about Remaking a government communications community and How to improve your Minister’s bio page - two subjects that can easily be applied to organizational communications as well.

Go ahead, take a look!

From The Friendly Ghost, a lesson that a truly prepared guest can counter an aggressive interviewer. An interview between Radio 4 presenter John Humphrys and Sir Sherard Cowper-Coles, the British Ambassador to Afghanistan, sputtered for a moment when the diplomat supported his arguments with fresh reporting from the BBC’s own website:

“…A short way into the piece, with Humphrys trying his best to put him off his stride, my ears pricked up because Cowper-Coles suddenly said “You only to have to see your own website this morning where quoted on it is an Afghan villager on a superb feature on the BBC website saying the Taliban is the biggest threat to the future of Afghanistan.”

“That’s brilliant,” I thought. “He’s saying ‘this is what you’re broadcasting on your own site - and I’ve been prepared enough to read it. I’m using your own techniques against you.’”

Cowper-Coles arrived for the interview with facts and personal anecdotes to support his position. This sort of preparation should be second nature for any communications specialist and spokesperson - and will help prepare them for any tense or confrontational moments during an interview.

The audio is on the BBC site - and his quote is right up front.

Cardinal Edward Egan is featured in the NYT, and one of the topics of discussion is his financial management of the Archdiocese of New York. Egan claims to have eliminated the Archdiocese’s deficit, and is paying down the debt. Still, he won’t release financial records - a step already taken by Los Angeles, Boston, Chicago and Brooklyn.

” … Will this white-haired prince of the Roman Catholic Church follow the lead of other large dioceses and release the archdiocese’s financial reports to the public?

Cardinal Egan considers the idea for a second or two, and offers a smile more suggestive of steel than humor. Wall Street titans sit on his finance council and study his ledgers. The cardinal sees no point in public inspection.

“I am transparent to the best possible people,” he said in a rare interview in his 20th floor office on First Avenue in Manhattan. “So when you say, ‘We don’t know,’ well, my ‘we’ knows.”

Wow. They really keep the local staff at arm’s length at Esso Jamaica:

“A spokesperson at Esso said she was unable to comment at this time as the managing director was off the island. She said the managing director would return next week.” (Jamaica Gleaner)

This was their response to a series of questions posed by the Gleaner in follow-up to a standoff between Esso and their Jamaican dealers last year.

That has to be the most pathetic brush off ever. Jamaica is connected to the rest of the world. What, did the managing director sail off into the distance on a dinghy without a satellite phone? Where in the world could the person go? Guyana?

The managing director is, after all, a country director for Esso. They are always in contact.

That reporter got pwnd. Bad.

Technorati Tags: Esso, Jamaica, spokesperson

Boring. Boring. Boring. Boring. Oh - and Fox News would like you to wear a tie, please. this from The Hill newspaper:

“Men have to get it right, too. They “can’t wear a suit that’s purple,” [Fox News’ Megyn Kelly] says, but a purple necktie or one with patterns is good. A blue shirt looks exceptionally good on TV — Bill Hemmer, Kelly’s co-anchor, “has about 30 different shades of blue for ties and they all look great,” she says.”

Sure. And Bill Hemmer also looks like “the frat boy most likely to be left behind naked at the grocery store during Rush Week.”

“On last Sunday’s “Meet the Press,” Richard Perle, former chairman of the Defense Policy Board, wore a blinding orange tie with a matching leather watchstrap. Didn’t work.

… And forget about going sleeveless. “I object to seeing any armpits on air. I don’t need to see that.”

That’s sleeveless for women, I hasten to point out. No-one needs to see Richard Perle in a sleeveless blouse.

The Chairman of the Hearts footie team in Edinburgh apparently has a habit of calling the local sports media “monkeys” - going as far have his PR staff give them bananas and nuts before a match last week. When the stadium sound system played The Monkees, the media in the press box heard a bit from the Hearts fans sitting near the box.

But the Chairman has to be admired for his allusions to Rudyard Kipling.

“Dear Monkeys,

… Your leader Mowgli is not taking bananas any more, now he is taking money for lies and untruthful interpretation. However he is greedy and makes you collect rotten information from cesspits and poisons readers with it. This is unworthy even of a monkey. Today I will express my opinion in English about refereeing in order that your Mowgli will not make you tell lies.

…

It is not without your help that traitors were presented as heroes thus showing the road to children for betrayal. You will always call teachers silly because unlike you they lead children along the correct path.

Protecting your values in that way just spoils not only football, but also a Scotsman’s proud name.

I beg you Mowgli, take the monkeys back to the Safari Park!

(www.heartsfc.co.uk)

• Where the hell are all the new political protest songs? So asks Duncan Campell at commentisfree. (Billy Bragg’s got one!)

• Brief profile of Laura Bush’s press secretary, Susan Dryden Whitson. Interesting fact about her life? She was American Idol winner Taylor Hick’s Grade 9 english teacher. (she’s had her rough patches - and I’m not counting the twin’s old partying habits)

• Jimmy Camp, Republican campaign activist, ne’er do well, punk rocker and accomplished singer/songwriter. Can you believe he opened for Willie Nelson, David Crosby and Huey Lewis & the News? Part I and Part II

• Confessions of an Ex-Pollster - the Op/Ed editor of the LA Times. A touch of self-immolation, but it balances out at the end. First lesson as a new pollster: “What I failed to grasp was that the primary purpose of our business was not to learn what voters think — but to determine how they could best be persuaded.”

Barack Obama’s current Senate press secretary is moving on to the Presidential campaign, and he emailed reporters about his replacement:

“Ben is a Virgo who enjoys talking on phone with reporters and leaking like a sieve.” (Politico)

As opposed to the normal approach taken by government officials in Washington, as cited in the “Scooter” Libby trial:

“…One of the signature moments in the case came this week, when veteran Washington Post reporter Walter Pincus was asked about the difficulty of getting top government officials to talk to him.

“Well, they’ll talk to me,” Pincus testified. “They just won’t give me information.” (LA Times)

Or maybe Robert Novak’s comments are revealing:

“… he had spent three fruitless years trying to land a single interview with former Deputy Secretary of State Richard L. Armitage.

“He had not only declined,” Novak said, “but indicated it wasn’t because he was too busy. He just didn’t want to see me.”

Did you know 2007 was the year of the attention economy? Saatchi & Saatchi seems to have decided that - its in their sig line. Our Italian colleagues have felt the magic touch of Saatchi’s attention - their Italian team reached out to marcomm writers to promote the launch of a client site. The release from Saatchi has drawn particular scorn from Gianluca and Italo because of its jargon-laden copy:

“…Il sito web, ItaliaIndependent.com, è on line dal 10 gennaio con una prima release di quella che si preannuncia una web experience magmatica, adrenalinica e fortemente interattiva. Figlio dell’era del crowdsourcing, in cui il consumatore diviene al tempo stesso target ed elemento cardine per la ideazione, progettazione e comunicazione del prodotto, italiaindependent.com è il primo passo di una self-building platform che saranno gli utenti stessi a generare, uploadando i propri contenuti.”

That copy is buzz-heavy, transparently self-serving, and the pitch was not well thought out. The site in question is completely coded in flash - and of consequence completely useless to bloggers who like to link to areas of particular interest. It seems the pitch was also accompanied by a .pdf file (linked at Gianluca’s post).

But the story gets better. Here in Canada, we’ve become used to buying up multiple URLs and top level domain names when working across languages. In the case of this site, it seems that an misspelt URL in a Reuters article let a small Italian marketing agency grab some attention (there’s that word again!) when it quickly snapped up the misspelt doman name.

Lessons learned from Saatchi’s pitch:

• Don’t try to sell milk to the milkman: throwing buzzwords and 2.0 concepts around will backfire if your work doesn’t back up the concept.
• Don’t misappropriate concepts: consumer as idea creator works - but not as well when you’re selling glasses at 1000 euros a crack. As one commenter points out on Gianluca’s blog, the average Italian metalworker makes 1000 euros a month.
• Personalize your pitch: once again, don’t mass mail your news release, especially when it provides very little detail.
• Follow-up with media, especially when they get your URL wrong.

Technorati Tags: Saatchi, italiaindependente, blogger outreach, blogger relations

$500 million can buy you a lot of freaking floating interstitials and marketing gimmicks, but it can’t stop the Chairman from behaving a little strangely. Granted, it’s unfair and uncharitable to compare Bill and Steve because they are very different managers with starkly contrasting personalities. Bill’s very much Brooks Brothers (and Barney’s when Melinda makes him dress up on the weekend). Steve, on the other hand, seems to have a whiff of 80s Benetton or Kappa about him.

Still, Blackfriar’s has something to say about Bill’s sometimes disconcerting behaviour with the media. Roger Ehrenberg dissects Bill’s Vista launch in more detail, including his gaffe at the Daily Show.

Of course, Bill Gates’ mistimed exit from his interview with Jon was nowhere as startling as Richard Simmons adjusting his “package” on the Today Show. Details, including reaction from Matt Lauer and video of the strategic redirection of the Simmons Beautyrest, at TMZ.

In the interests of fairness, Matt Lauer tells the producers to “stop the tape.” Richard may have pretaped part of his appearance - but he still should have waited until the cameras were off before “repositioning his mobile launch system.”

(vidcap courtesy of TMZ)

Technorati Tags: media training, television gaffes

Life as an alternative journalist bounces around the Sundance Film Festival. A lengthy feature in the LA Weekly. 

“…Much of Main Street gets converted into a promotional Potemkin village, but this is the most heavily fortified center of celebrity shoulder-rubbing and free stuff. In another act of festival identity theft, I got a badge for The Village from a friend, and even though it says Ivana Schechter-Garcia and features her picture,

I took the risk that a quick, strategic flash would get me in, which is why I am now enjoying free food in The Village’s T-Mobile–sponsored café, watching Billy Baldwin get his photograph taken through the window.

Outside, a security guard named Alan describes all the other famous faces he’s seen from his post at The Village: “somebody off That ’70s Show”; “the girl from Scary Movie”; “a guy from The Matrix”; “that dude from 90210”; “oh yeah — and Tara Reid.” (LA Weekly)

Notes on the Super Bowl media day, held on Tuesday:

Chicago Bears Safety Chris Harris said the wierdest question asked to him was: “Who’s your favorite horse?” The answer? ”Mr. Ed or that guy on ‘Gumby.’”

Also asked: ”If you were on a deserted island, which cast member of ‘Saved by the Bell’ would you prefer to keep you company?”

The answer? “Kelly.”

Not that the media was very controlled: the Bears’ Rashied Davis observed … “You guys are like ants on a Popsicle.” (recordonline)

“How To Spice Up Super Bowl Media Day” from Fox Sports. An assortment of reporters and columnists list their gripes and irritants under the guise of humour. Most common complaint? Cliches.

That list didn’t include, though, Ines Sainz from TV Azteca, who apparently had no trouble roping in players for interviews.

Technorati Tags: media day, Super Bowl, Ines Sainz

As Hans points out over at Media Culpa, the buzz will only build from here ….

In Spiegel magazine, there� is a detailed and fascinating article about the team of lawyers, social workers and media advisors working with Natascha Kampusch - the Austrian girl held captive in a basement for over eight years. It deals with the many steps taken to manage her re-emergence into the world, and how her advisors helped the young lady manage the media pressure.

” … Dietmar Ecker has a plan too. He sits on his bright yellow leather chair in his media consultant’s office in Vienna’s eighth district. Everything is very stylish - high ceilings; steel and glass doors; modern art. He was one of the last to join the team of Natascha Kampusch’s advisors, the team that cares for her and protects her from the public. But today he’s the most important person in the team: It’s Wednesday, the day that an interview with Natascha will be aired on Austria’s public television channel ORF.

Ecker sports a six-day salt-and-pepper beard and drives a Porsche. Normally he works as a consultant for trade unions in difficult situations. He also does public relations work for the Republic of Serbia. Years ago, he managed to astound everyone by improving the popularity of an Austrian Finance Minister. Now he’s working for Natascha Kampusch free of charge.

Ecker is a professional. He knows how the media work. He takes a sheet of paper, draws a horizontal line and adds five numbered marks, from zero to four. The zero mark represents the day of Natascha’s escape, August 24. The last mark represents the end of the fourth week following her escape. “This is where the media normally lose interest,” Ecker says. He’s familiar with the phenomenon from election campaigns. The mechanisms are the same, he says, that’s just how these things work - the public’s attention span is predictable when it comes to sensational events …” (Spiegel� magazine)

More about the media’s sometimes unseemly interest in the young lady from the Independent.�

Holla to Marginal Revolution for the pointer.

NPR profiles John Sawatsky, a former investigative journalist and university professor, now on staff at ESPN� and charged with� teaching sports reporters how to ask difficult questions and produce better interviews.

(But who’s going to teach ESPN’s Tony Kornheiser how to react to criticism?)

ESPN’s interest in Sawatsky was piqued by a piece in AJR, “The Question Man“:

“Savvy sources are on to all of us, spinning back, all heat and no light, precisely because “we’re asking the wrong questions,” he says. Under attack, journalists are conceding defeat to well-oiled propaganda machines without really understanding why they’re losing. In the last decade, media trainers have become such a growth industry, “you can even find them among businessmen in Newfoundland,” Sawatsky says, teaching politicians and executives “how to run circles around journalists.”

“It’s a sophisticated battle for control,” he says. … Sawatsky contends the “message trackers are winning,” thanks to journalists who too often rely on outdated, conventional approaches to interviewing. Sawatsky denounces standard interviewing techniques as “the old methodology,” often characterized as a power struggle between interviewer and subject, as a battle of wills, a game to be won or lost.” (AJR, October 2000)

More observations about the inherent lethargy and lack of imagination exhibited by most interviewers can be found in a 2004 piece from the Ryerson Review of Journalism:

” … The easy question is anathema to Nardwuar the Human Serviette, who interviews bands for MuchMusic’s Going Coastal and has his own radio show in Vancouver. He spends hours preparing for an interview, surfing the Internet, reading music magazines and listening to music. “I’m lucky enough that I have the time, whereas other people could probably create the time but they’re too lazy or too busy doing other things,” Nardwuar says. “I won’t take on an interview unless I think I can do enough research for it.” … “

For an example of Narduar’s outrageous technique, I point you to Narduar� vs. Henry Rollins, originally shot in 1998.

Many more observations about� interview techniques and outcomes can be found at The Media Interview blog.

For corporate types, Donna Papacosta’s Trafcom� podcast covered interviewing� secrets� during two broadcasts (1, 2) back in July.

Douglas Fisher, a longtime columnist, observer of Canadian politics and one-time Member of Parliament, spoke to the Hill Times upon his retirement at the age of 86. Included was a cutting observation about the Parliamentary Press Gallery, an organization that lately has attempted to hold the Prime Minister to account for his relative lack of media access:

“…The Parliamentary Press Gallery is a device that was created in order to ration in access and limit the reporting of politics on Parliament Hill in an ordered way. That’s the way I’ve always looked upon the Parliamentary Press Gallery. The gallery as a collective hasn’t any real function journalistically relating to what you might call ‘the profession.’ It’s just a device or an organization that enables the speaker and the government of the day to have a fairly normal and ordered relationship. So it’s not something, it’s not a collective of professional people who are carrying out or living up to any particular professional crude. [credo? sp.] …”

Three thoughts for today:

- Hershey’s hits a home run coming out of the 2006 All Candy Expo: a writer for Progressive Grocer drops by the company’s booth at the show and plants a big sloppy kiss on the company and its community health and education initiatives. The only way that piece could have come off better for the Hershey’s folk is if it came “with release.”

- Picked up my ticket for the Billy Bragg show in town September 23. Determined not to pay the Ticketmaster “convenience fee,” I bought it from a little independent music shop, End Hits. They’re likely suffering from the same pressures (and lack of attention) as other music shops, but the fact that their web presence emphasizes community events, local bands and new releases shows they’ve got their head on right. (As an aside - several different ways a kid could spend $20 on music)

- A book that seems promising (although it has not been reviewed by anyone) is Econospinning: How to Read Between the Lines When the Media Manipulate the Numbers, by Gene Epstein, the economics editor for Barron’s. From his publisher’s blurb on Amazon:

“… He then exposes shoddy reporting by a laundry list of economic journalists, providing the dos and don’ts to guide readers to the best options: who to believe, who to respect, who to argue with, and who to run away from screaming. From Paul Krugman (The New York Times) to John Cassidy (The New Yorker), as well as others including, but in no way limited to, Eric Schlosser (Fast Food Nation), Barbara Ehrenreich (Nickel and Dimed), Louis Uchitelle (Goldman Sachs’ Economics Research Group), and Patrick Barta (Wall Street Journal), Epstein does a point-by-point discussion on how readers can get their feet on the ground floor of economics information, and provides readers with a list of his trusted recommendations.”

(hat tip to marginal revolution)

In a story about the British government’s efforts to make manufacturers reduce the salt levels in their snacks and foods, I found this amusing snippet implying a Pappudum vs. Yorkshire Pudding rivalry. The Times (London) discussed the lobbying and negotiation tactics between manufacturers and the Food Standards Agency.

Over the course of the article, it was revealed that Patak’s had argued that they should be exempted from more stringent controls on the amount of salt in their pappadums and, instead, the much more traditional Yorkshire Pudding should bear the brunt of the cuts. I guess it’s a cultural shift, much like the difference between Coronation Street vs. Footballers’ Wives.

“Patak’s wanted poppadums exempted because only 16 per cent of households ate them. It suggested that Yorkshire puddings should bear the strain, an argument the agency resisted.(Times Online)

… Mr. Hanks was initially reluctant to be interviewed for this article. “Why would I want to — so I could see my name in the paper tomorrow?” he joked. “I get my name in the paper when I go out and buy socks. I go to Gray’s Papaya in New York and I’m on Defamer.com.”

Quoted in a NYT profile of his production company, Playtone.

Is your management team considering outsourcing your publicity/public relations function? Were your media mention measurements skewed by the inordinate coverage of your employee lockout? Ever wonder how stupid advertising value equivalency sounds as a measurement indicator in an actual interview setting?

You have to read Antonia Zerbisias’ discussion of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation’s decision to outsource their publicity machine. Now with added official spokesperson flavour!

Part 1: Profiles in Privatization

Part 2: Viewership sinking

Update: Part 3: I’d like to know where you got the promotion

Big campaign against astroturf brewing, propelled by the energy of Paull Young. I’ve commented on astroturf before, and don’t think very highly of the perceptual sleight-of-hand that many astroturf campaigns rely upon. Like planting subject matter experts at public consultation sessions.

Much more cogitation about falsely fuelled public information campaigns at Trevor’s blog and Paull’s page on the NewPR Wiki.

Technorati: astroturf

Rock legend, that’s what it draws upon. Comedy gold, that’s its potential. The Kiss Coffeehouse is now open in Myrtle Beach, people! Promoting the unlikely combination of lifestyle beverages and debauched personal lifestyle would be a dream assignment for any agency type. Your creative juices should flow freely when drawing up these marketing materials. The inspiration is evident from the menu, beginning with the Frozen Roccucino and ending with the “assorted cakes, pies and sweets (as priced)”.

Even for a relatively uninspired public relations flack, this is an opportunity for puns, thinly veiled insider jokes and loaded quotes. Unless, of course, you resort to the dreaded exclamation mark. One is acceptable. One exclamation mark plays the same sort of role as Rod Roddy did on The Price is Right: reminding you that being excited and sweaty is preferable to stone bored and still. Two exclamation marks? Your event better involve large cash prizes or superstar wrestlers. Three? Now you’re in Ron Popeil and Mike Levey territory.

“According to Paul Stanley, “The KISS Coffeehouse is our way of providing everyone with the buzz of great, quality treats and coffee filled with enough sugar and caffeine to get the party started, and keep it going!”

Gene Simmons adds, “Every army needs food and drink and the KISS Army is no exception! Even the non-enlisted will find our treats and java rockin’ good!” (news release)

Want more information? Turn to a member of the Kiss Army for a first-person account of the store opening!