Chicago's hippest eateries don't get cool without some help.
byShelly Ridenour
It's a Saturday night at Más, and the place is packed with the type of people who would no doubt strike fear in the hearts of the surrounding neighborhood's anti-gentrification set -- lots of black chic, a smattering of handkerchief tops, Kate Spade bags lined up along the bar, Kenneth Cole oxfords and boots tucked beneath tables. Whether they came from the neighboring streets of Wicker Park and Bucktown, Old Town, the Gold Coast or the burgeoning hipster hotspots of Logan Square and Humboldt Park remains to be seen, but one thing's for sure: They're not here by accident.
The beautiful people may think they're here because the arepas con camerones is delicious, or because Chef John Manion lead the summer ceviche trend with a creative charge, because they read about it in Bon Appetit, or even just because they want to see and be seen; all of the above could be true, but they likely wouldn't know about any of it if it wasn't for Ellen Malloy.
While Manion and his cuisine may be the star of the show, it is Malloy who shines the spotlight on the place. Herself a former cook (at March' and Carlo's in Highwood) -- albeit one with an MBA -- Malloy is the owner of Paperclip, a public relations and marketing firm for "high-end Chicago restaurants -- by that, it's an issue of quality more than price." Paperclip's clients include the soon-to-open but already much-hyped JaponiSante, Goose Island Brew Pubs ("a casual concept but the product is so top-notch it fits in our mix") and bottled products, Michael Jordan's in-the-works Chapel Hill project 23 and critical darling onesixtyblue.
"Our job is to get butts in seats. Butts-in-seats. Butts-in-seats," Malloy stresses. "That's the key. We do marketing as well as media'media hits, direct mail, preferred customer programs, concierges programs' But creating an image is also what we're here to do. You have to make sure that the way the restaurant is perceived is how they want to be seen."
"A lot of restaurants want to be trendy -- but the danger there is that the people who follow trends are fickle. You have to fill seats during the week as well as the weekend," says media relations specialist Cindy Kurman. "You need to make sure you have good cross-pollination. You want the beautiful people who are sophisticated and cool, so that other people will go there to see them and be a part of that. But you also want the people who enjoy good food, who have sophisticated tastes and will appreciate the place and talk about it and bring their friends."
Kurman has been "branding" indelible images into our collective psyches long since that was the PR buzz word of the moment. While her background is actually in automotives -- at age 21, while on staff at Crain's Automotive News in Detroit, she was named the "Best Meeting Planner in the Country" for creating the Automotive News World Conference -- she got into restaurant and hospitality marketing via a working relationship with McDonald's, of all places. She branched out on her own, under the Kurman Communications umbrella, sixteen years ago, and now represents the likes of Tru, Nonno Pino, Einstein Brothers Bagels, Caliterra, Bistrot Zinc, the just-opened Fuzio and Brio.
"As far as establishing an image is concerned, Tru's a little different, because we have a high-profile chef," Kurman says. "But Brio's more of a challenge: You have a new place, a new chef and a new concept in Spanish cuisine. How do you reach the young people who will think the restaurant is beautiful? How do you let them know it's not just a tapas place, like they're used to, but a full menu and a place to try new foods?"
To that end, culinary PR reps employ both traditional tactics, like working media outlets -- "If you're a decent restaurant, you can assume you'll get reviewed," Kurman says -- and maintaining mailing lists, as well as more creative plans of action. Concierges are important when it comes to feeding image and filling seats; keeping tabs on seasonal promotional possibilities is key. "For instance, September is National Honey Month," Kurman says. "I would go to the National Honey Board and say, 'Do you need recipes to send to national editors? I have clients with unusual recipes.'"
And then there's the serendipity factor -- the Idaho Potato council love the french fries at Caliterra, so they willingly promoted them nationally; former Kurman client Flat Top Grill was featured in Newsweek for offering valet Rollerblading -- but even that can't be worn on your sleeve. "You have to know the restaurant inside and out, almost as if it was your own," Malloy explains. "But there's always more to learn. That's why we keep the ratio low (six restaurants, three full-time employees). Some clients are everyday. We have to be on call 24 hours a day -- we have cell phones, they have our home numbers. You have to know them intimately. We're there to help, whatever it takes to make that restaurant work. If they need me to hostess that night, I've done that."
Still, it's pretty hard to feel sorry for someone who admits that, until she recently moved into a place with a nicer kitchen, she ate out "six nights a week, mostly in clients' restaurants." Especially when one of those restaurants (onesixtyblue) was determined by Esquire to be one of the best restaurants to open in the United States in the last year -- the kind of beautiful-people-attracting image you can't buy.
copyright 1999 New City Communications, Inc.