Valley PR Blog’s 2006 “Hypie” Award: Pink Taco

By on January 2nd, 2007 In Hype!

The most unforgettable Valley PR campaign of 2006 was Pink Taco, which, along with PR firm Rose & Allyn wins our first (hopefully annual) Hype of the Year (or “Hypie”) award.

Pink Taco, a Las Vegas-based restaurant company, opened its second venue in June at the Scottsdale Waterfront. (Not that you didn’t already know that).

This is a client many local firms would have been content to get 15 seconds of fame at launch with the obligatory owner profile and some party pix; then, to make the rounds with the glossies ad nauseum for restaurant reviews afterward. Many clients would have been happy with just that, too.

Instead, Pink Taco was a PR campaign in the truest sense. Helped along by a little Vegas glitz, a few attention-whore celebs, and the Scottsdale City Council, they “did launch” and then some.

Hype aside, the PR pros thought on their feet and came up with solutions that upped the ante at every stage.

First and foremost, they had to deal with the fine Arizona tradition of prude, PR-ignorant lawmakers creating moral mountains out of molehills – or in this case, tostadas – to make the state a national laughing stock. Somehow, the name “Pink Taco” was offensive to Scottsdale (but the tax revenue wasn’t?) and this merited public comment.

Whether it was just an attention-grabbing wire story or a PR-stoked dream controversy, the story went nationwide. How many of you can say your client appeared on “SNL” or “The Daily Show” — or for that matter, national celeb rags like People, Us Weekly or In Touch?

Not only that, the Rose & Allyn folks followed it up with a killer audible from the “I’m rubber and you’re glue” playbook. They broke their Ferris Bueller “What? Moi?” posture, called a press conference and let Sheriff Joe Arpaio do the talkin’ – with a brilliant “pink underwear” fundraiser. As usual, Maricopa County’s best PR man said it best: “I don’t know what the controversy is…but…you’re getting a lot of free press.”

And then, with the restaurant’s image well-established, Pink Taco went for the hype-jugular with a no-lose modest proposal: putting in a very public, very unsolicited bid to name Cardinals Stadium – they even had a logo made up — and should owner Peter Morton be held to his word, the cash to make it happen.

Pink Taco put the Bidwills in a position where they had to comment and once they took the bait, the hype was on. Rovian, Barnum-esque, beautiful – that just could be the local PR move of the decade. The best part about it, is that Pink Taco Stadium is much better-sounding than what was ultimately accepted (University of Phoenix).

I’m sure we don’t know the half of this. Hopefully, Jason Rose and team will join us here sometime with a war story.

In the meantime, we’ll just be satisfied in crowning Pink Taco with the first of what should be many PR awards.

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