Burger King paying for wedding of Mr Burger and Miss King in great reactive PR stunt

By on Tuesday, April 7, 2015

Last week the State Journal-Register – a daily paper serving Springfield, Illinois – wrote this story, highlighting an upcoming wedding:

Burger King SJR

In short, Joel Burger and Ashley King are two college sweethearts from New Berlin, Illinois. They’ve known each other since kindergarten, been together since fifth grade and are getting married in July.

And Burger King is now paying for the whole wedding, in one of the best reactive PR efforts of the year, for me.

The SJ-R story exploded, leading to this point. According to this post by Dave Bakke:

The New York Daily News posted [the original story]. The Huffington Post reposted it. Soon I was hearing from BuzzFeed, the Daily Mail in the U.K. and a producer from Australia’s #1 Radio Show, which happens to be The Kyle and Jackie O Show. (But, then, you knew that.)

This all began innocently enough with SJ-R business editor Tim Landis. He spotted the unique Burger-King engagement announcement and photograph in the Chatham Clarion. He put it on my desk in case I thought it could make a column. For my part, all I had to do was recognize it as one.

Since Ashley had already tried to reach out to the Burger King company, but unsuccessfully, I sent an email to the company’s media relations representative. I soon heard from Alison Brod Public Relations in New York City, the company that has the Burger King account. I sent them an email about the wedding, they contacted the company, and Burger King took it from there.

Which culminated Monday afternoon when Joel and Ashley got the big news from Burger King via Skype. Ashley’s dad, Vince King, was there to help celebrate, as was Joel’s mom, Cindy Burger.

Kudos to Alison Brod Public Relations, Burger King and journalist Dave Brakke.

Source: Buzzfeed

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