Media Fun

Hey guys,

Doing my placement in the lead up to a big event has given me a lot of insight into the amount of work that needs to be done before the event, not only for the actual event, but for next years events as well. The main role of the consultancy on the committee of this festival is media relations. In the week leading up to the festival, we issued an email to all the morning breakfast programs, plus some additional programs we thought suitable to our target audience, asking them if we could stop by the studio and drop off a treat. Alain Fabreaug, a well known Perth chef, and one of the big names appearing at the festival had prepared us a truffled brie cheese. So early one morning, me and my supervisor went around to some of the morning programs to drop of our little ‘truffle treats’ and speak to the producers about the festival and all the key information. Although a very early start, it was a fun exercise and showed me that there is interesting ways that you can approach media outlets to get your message on air. Out of the radio stations we went to that morning, we got at least one mention on all of them.
After our early morning radio drop off, we went to restaurant Amuse in East Perth to conduct a photo shoot for an article that was going to be appearing in the following days paper. The photo was of three of the big name chefs that were going to be at the master class at the truffle festival. This was fun because I got to meet all three chefs, and being a lover of Poh’s kitchen on ABC I met Emmanuel, so that was great! The photo shoot was great to observe because it was all about getting the right photo to go with the story.


Once the photo shoot was finished we headed off to a radio station to pre record an interview that was going to be aired in a few days. This was great because I got to sit in on the interview with Jane, one of the festival organisers as well as a self proclaimed foodie, and the big couch. It was just a good experience seeing what goes on during an interview and as it wasn't a live interview it made it easier to make sure the most important things were mentioned at some point during it.

In regards to the earlier comment I made about the preparation that goes into it for not only this year, but also next years event, that was shown to me through the briefing of the photographers and the camera crew for the day. The instructions given to them were made specifically for the images we wanted to capture for certain target audiences such as families, or the media. And Christine already knew what footage we had from previous years to it could always be spliced together in a film so it was un necessary to re film those shots again. When briefing a photographer you have to be specific in letting them know what you want, because often when you say one thing they may think you mean a completely different thing.

All in all was a very good day. Got to see a lot of the practical side of approaching and operating with the media, and got to meet a few big names of Perth which is always a bit of fun.