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  StartechStartech Environmental Corporation, based in Wilton, Connecticut, is the pioneer in an exciting new environmental technology called plasma pyrolisis. Basically, Startech uses the extreme heat of a plasma field (plasmas are super-heated gasses) to dissolve the molecular bonds of any material. Within Startech’s system temperatures reach as high as 30,000 degrees F, with an average temperature of 6,000 degrees F. These extreme temperatures trigger a process called molecular dissociation, which reduces materials to their constituent parts and gives off a clean, energy-producing gas as a byproduct.
Schwartz PR StrategyThe Startech PR campaign had three objectives:
Schwartz Communications first conducted a media audit of plasma conversion and Startech Environmental. This effort showed that very little had been written on the subject or the company. After meeting with Startech to learn its business, the agency team quickly determined that it would approach the challenge of publicizing Startech with these primary story angles:
Within days of starting work for Startech the Schwartz team had prepared background press materials, a variety of targeted media pitches and a list of key talking points. The PR strategy called for a “bottom up” approach, first securing coverage in chemical, environmental and waste industry publications so we could use these stories later when pitching the local and national business press. ResultsThe Startech PR campaign took an obscure, little-known technology and an unknown company and within a year raised awareness of both to the national and international level.The team lined up several interviews within the first week of the program and the first stories started to appear. The trade coverage included articles in:
A few months into the campaign the Schwartz team expanded the media outreach to include reporters from regional print and broadcast media outlets. We arranged for reporters to visit Startech’s demo facility in Bristol, Connecticut. This resulted in feature coverage in:
With the groundwork laid in technical and regional media, the team began pitching national business press. The first significant placement was in Newsweek, which featured Startech in the Periscope section on February 9, 2004, in a story titled “Trash into Treasure?” Shortly after the Newsweek piece, Schwartz worked with Reuters to develop a story titled “Hot trash-to-fuel technology gathering steam.” The story appeared in Forbes.com and USA Today.com, among many others. The Schwartz team then arranged for a reporter from Fortune to visit the demo facility. This visit and briefing (during which the reporter witnessed the plasma converter destroying several items he brought with him) resulted in a two-page story with photos in the May 3, 2004, issue of Fortune (“Test-Driving the Destroyatron.”). Schwartz also placed Startech features in ABCNews.com (“Trash Zappers: New Technologies Turn Garbage Into Energy”), Associated Press (Wilton Company Future of Limitless Trash”) and the Wall Street Journal (Drying Up Waste Stream With Power of the Sun”). The Schwartz team also pursued awards for Startech’s technology. Among the highlights, The Wall Street Journal named Startech a winner of its inaugural Technology Innovation Awards. Startech won first place in the category of Materials and Other Base Technologies. Industry Week’s Annual Technology & Innovation Awards also recognized Startech’s Plasma Converter as a notable innovation. As a result of the coverage the company has been invited to bid on large contracts in the U.S., Latin America, Europe and Asia. The company also secured supplemental funding and signed up resellers in Australia, New Zealand and Puerto Rico. Below is an excerpt from a letter by Startech CEO Joseph Longo: “Startech engaged Schwartz Communications in 2004 to take on a real PR challenge. Ours is a very small company that has developed an important but unknown new technology. At the time we started our work with Schwartz we had no systems installed and no significant sales wins. Despite this, we asked Schwartz Communications to create widespread coverage for our company and our product, not only in the technical press but in the major national media. “In a very short time Schwartz began generating coverage for us. Within just a few months our company appeared in Newsweek, Fortune, Reuters, the Wall Street Journal, Industry Week, the Associated Press and many others. The great coverage continues to this day. Our press coverage has helped generate sales leads, and recently we closed our first three multi-million dollar deals for Plasma Converters.”
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Bilbao Museoa, 2002 All rights reserved. Total or partial reproduction prohibited.
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