Crossroads Market

Services Used: Media Relations and Social Media

PR Goals: Crossroads Market sought PR support to raise its profile in the city and to connect with its target audience.

What We Did: PARKER PR drove awareness for the market by developing a comprehensive media relations strategy that included highlighting individual vendors as well as unique market events and initiatives. PARKER PR created a social media strategy that highlights the uniqueness of the market.

Impact: Crossroads Market and its vendors have been featured in the Calgary Herald, CTV, Global, QR and more, totalling 1.1M ad value equivalency in one month and reaching 122M people. PARKER PR has grown its Instagram account by over 1,000 followers with a combination of photos and reels.

Astra Group

Services Used: Media Relations and Community Engagement

PR Goals: Astra Group was looking to increase their profile in the city and to position themselves as industry leaders, with a focus on Office to Residential Conversions.

What We Did: PARKER PR drove awareness for Astra Group's Office to Residential Conversion projects and their support in the community. PARKER PR developed and implemented a media relations strategy to raise awareness for the projects and charity initiatives that included writing press releases, pitching to local and national media contacts and inviting media to attend all events.

Impact: Astra Group has successfully been awarded multiple grants from the City of Calgary under the Downtown Calgary Development Incentive Program. Astra has launched two annual charity initiatives which include the Gift of Christmas Dinner and Halloween Costume drive. Maxim Olshevsky, CEO of Astra Group has been the recipient of the Top 40 Under 40, Business in Calgary Leader of the Year award and was a Prairie Finalist for EY Entrepreneur of the Year. Astra’s work in office to residential conversion projects has been recognized nationally and internationally, including features in the San Franciso Chronicles, Global and CTV>

Contemporary Calgary

Services Used: Media Relations

PR Goals: Contemporary Calgary wanted to build brand awareness and promote its annual Look Gala and the accompanying L23K art auction. PARKER PR aimed to secure organic media coverage across North America and Europe to help raise the highest possible funds through ticket sales for the gala and the coveted auction.

What We Did: PARKER PR drove awareness for The Look Gala 2023 and L23K art auction as a not-to-be-missed one-night-only celebration of art and fashion in Calgary. PARKER PR developed and implemented a targeted media relations and influencer strategy to raise awareness including writing press releases, pitching to local, national and international media contacts, and subsequently providing on-site media relations support and inviting key community members to the gala.

Impact: The sold-out Look Gala raised a record-breaking $1,070,000, with all proceeds supporting Contemporary Calgary's expansive programs and exhibitions. Most importantly, for the first time everyone who came to LOOK received an annual membership to the gallery—that’s 1,194 new members—a 33% increase overnight! Contemporary Calgary's media coverage value for this campaign translated to $119.41k, with 60 notable media mentions, reaching an audience of 12.91 million across 4 countries.

Bankers Hall

Services Used: Influencer Engagement & Content Creation

PR Goals: Bankers Hall wanted to highlight the downtown mall as a destination for Calgarians to shop locally during the Holiday season.  

What We Did: PARKER PR engaged five local influencers, each with different audiences, to post about their experience shopping at Bankers Hall. PARKER PR also created photography and video content for Bankers Hall to post on their own social media accounts, including retail spotlight videos and a walk-through video of the whole mall. 

Impact: The influencers had a reach of a combined 350k followers. Multiple videos were produced, highlighting the unique retailers and business owners at Bankers Hall.

Modern Steak

Services Used: Media Relations & Partnership Building

PR Goals: Modern Steak wanted to build brand awareness, with a focus on opening their third location in Calgary. They hoped to build partnership and get involved in community initiatives

What We Did: PARKER PR drove awareness for Modern Steak’s Suicide Prevention Dinner, a fundraiser for the Centre of Suicide Prevention. PARKER PR developed and implemented a media relations strategy to raise awareness including writing the press release and pitching to local and national media contacts, inviting media to attend the dinner and offering event support. 

Impact: The Suicide prevention dinner had acquired $300,00 in monetary value for both articles and broadcast. A total of 31 million people had viewed the articles written about the fundraiser while 1.3 million people viewed the TV segments. 

Porch

Services Used: Content Creation & Media Relations

PR Goals: Porch hired PARKER PR as they were opening to support the successful launch of their new restaurant and to capture the restaurant through video and photography to promote the restaurant on social media. 

What We Did: PARKER PR developed a strategy that included Media Relations, activations, and influencer engagement. We distributed press releases to our contacts and invited media and influencer contacts to the opening and to visit the restaurant for the months following the opening. We set up multiple photo and video shoots to capture a variety of shots including product, people, and the space. 

Impact: Porch was covered in various local publications including, Avenue Magazine, The Globe and Mail, Calgary Herald, DailyHive, and Curiocity. Porch was also included in Calgary’s Top 10 New Restaurants 2021. The value of earned media based on the coverage was over $185K.

Kensington BRZ

Services Used: Events, Media Relations, Partnership Building

PR Goals: The Kensington BRZ aims to bring awareness to the Kensington community and businesses by highlighting local initiatives. They hope to bring the community together through key events and activations that celebrate the unique area. 

What We Did: PARKER PR managed a series of activations throughout the year including Christmas in Kensington, Chinook Blast and Kensington Love Letters. Each activation involved unique elements such as hosting local artists to perform, running contests to promote local shops, bringing the community together by asking Calgarians to write a love letter to Kensington, and holding the annual Christmas in Kensington, which included Santa, sleigh rides, musical performances.

Impact: From October 2020 to September 2021, the monetary value for radio segments was 33.4K while broadcast and articles was 238K. Media coverage highlighted how the community was bringing back live music after a tough year with the pandemic, and the need to support local businesses. A total of 25 million people viewed or read the Kensington articles and TV segments while 3 million people listened to radio segments featuring the BRZ. 

Fairmont Palliser

Services Used: Media Relations

PR Goals: Fairmont Palliser and Hawthorn Dining Room & Bar’s goal was to grow brand awareness by highlighting the unique experiences at the hotel and restaurant.

What We Did: PARKER PR helped create a media relations strategy for the Fairmont Palliser’s first holiday themed pop-up bar, the Tipsy Elf. This included curating the invitation list, developing invitations, inviting media, strategic influencers, and prominent guests, managing partnership opportunities, writing press releases and pitching to local media.

Impact: The Tipsy Elf received over $21,000 in earned media coverage and was featured in local news outlets, including Avenue Magazine and on CTV. More than 2.3 million people were reached through this media coverage. The Tipsy Elf has been an extremely successful experience, bringing in hundreds of customers a day, growing brand awareness for Fairmont Palliser and Hawthorn Dining Room & Bar.

Holt Renfrew, Hawthorn Dining Room & Bar, Calgary Philharmonic Orchestra

Services Used: Events & Partnerships

PR Goals:The goals of each client was to increase brand awareness, build strategic partnerships, and raise important funds for the Calgary Philharmonic Orchestra (CPO), who had been out of work due to the pandemic. 

What We did: To achieve these goals, PARKER PR partnered with CH Financial and Holt Renfrew to host a fundraiser for the CPO at the Hawthorn Dining Room & Bar. The event featured brunch, Veuve Clicquot champagne, a live music performance from the CPO, a fashion presentation from Holt Renfrew’s lead stylist, and a $50 gift card to Holt Renfrew. PARKER PR managed the event and invited a curated list of media and notable community members to partake in the brunch and shopping fundraiser. 

Impact: The event successfully contributed to building strategic partnerships amongst CPO, CH Financial, Holt Renfrew and Hawthorn. Each business benefited from the other’s reach, growing brand awareness. The CPO was able to raise several thousand dollars to support the musicians and the organization , contributing to a thriving arts community in Calgary. In terms of media coverage, the event was featured on QR770 and Global TV.