Tomorrow's Business Today
The return of the embargoed RNS
My favourite – this happens at least three times a day – is the offer of a story embargoed till midnight for the Evening Standard.
Erm, the paper comes out at midday.
In the old, much better days, embargoed RNS’s were commonplace. They still make sense.
So the 7am announcement could magically be covered and even commented on for a paper going to print at 8am because the hack got the statement and the briefing at 6am, or even the night before.
For announcements coming at 7pm — that’s far less common, obviously — the City Editor for the morning paper gets a briefing at 5pm, so he can hit a deadline at 8pm.
This stuff requires trust on each side, but that shouldn’t be beyond us.
It is possibly in breach of City rules, but again, see above.
It improves the chance of positive coverage and reduces the chance of errors because words are not being fired off in a hurry.
I am pleased to report the (slight) return of the embargoed RNS.
Twice lately, after wine in the sun, the issue was raised. And flaks who have been in the game since about 1870 said, oh yeh, why don’t we do that like we used to?
One time it worked, and one time it didn’t really, but no one was hurt.
This idea applies double to announcements that have a cracking picture attached.
If I had one of them in my hands, right now, the picture (but not the sensitive words) would already be on the page for tomorrow, ready to go…
Press release of the day
Workplace chaos and drunk staff anticipated over jubilee bank holiday, warns this from employment expert Citation.
Staff are confused, or pretending to be, over whether the bank holiday includes the Monday. Some of them won’t turn up because of that.
There will be problematic street parties on the Sunday, which may cause hangovers.
It is written as a warning, but also works as a how-to guide.
Stories that will keep rolling
1) What is the cost to the Russian economy so far of the Ukraine war?
2) What is the market reaction to the Sunak support package?
3) Is the Musk Twitter deal dead?
4) What do economic woes do to diversity drives at work?
