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5W Public Relations is an American public relations firm with two offices in New York City and Los Angeles. Since its founding in 2003, it has grown to more than 80 employees as of May 2007.
According to the O'Dwyers PR news website 5W Public Relations netted $9,320,477 in fees in 2006 an increase of 85% from 2005 figures .
O'Dwyers has ranked the company #22 in earnings among their top 135 ranked PR companies; and it has given it the 13th spot for top entertainment PR firms among its top 40 in that category. 5W Public Relations is considered by the Holmes Report as the “Fastest Growing public relations firm in the nation”
History
Founded by Ronn Torossian in 2003, the company launched from a small office within a Manhattan based travel agency with only three client and two employees. Under his leadership, the company's client list expanded to well over 100 and in under three years, the staff roster grew to 75
Clients
Among the list of the firm's clients are Anheuser-Busch, Evian Water, American Bible Society, Wolfgang's Vault, Benny Hinn ministries, Regent University, Pastor John Hagee and his Christians United for Israel organization, Shalom TV, members of the Israeli Knesset, Restaurants, hotels, entertainers and musicians and an array of diverse public and private interests consisting of brick and mortar companies as well as tech and high-tech.
In December 2006, the Foreign Ministry of Israel worked with 5W and Elias Buchwald (one of the founders of Burson-Marsteller) to train Israel's top spokespersons on western media and communications methods .
In March 2005 PR Week reported that The Lebanese American Council for Democracy, the "group that played a key role in the passage of the Syrian Accountability Act," retained 5W Public Relations for "strategic counsel and media relations." The group's goal is "to gain support from U.S. political leaders and United Nations officials to pressure Syria to withdraw its troops." The group is reportedly "closely aligned with Michel Aoun, the former Prime Minister who was ousted by the Syrians" in 1990. The 5W firm was "preparing daily briefing sheets for the media to respond to current events." The Syrian Accountability Act, passed in 2003, "imposed sanctions on Syria for occupying Lebanon."
Eclectic Client Base
The diverse and odd nature of 5W's clientele bring right-wing Jewish and Christian groups and international issue-based government and policy groups under the same roof as some of the most well know rap and hip-hop artists and online gaming clients.
At the 2007 Sundance Film Festival, 5W created the "5W Sundance Escape Mansion, and held four days and nights of clublike atmospheres for the stars attending the festival.
Controversy
The NY Post has called its CEO a "publicity guru", and Fox News a "high-powered PR CEO", CNN as "a leading PR expert". CBS National News said that "Ronn Torossian knows spin," and a 2005 NY Times feature story on Torossian referred to him as "The consummate hard-driving, scrappy NY publicist."
Yet, Torossian had been mentioned on on PR industry blogs for what some had termed, "self-promotional activity" .
in 2006, 5W bought variations of websites domain names of several of its competitors and linked them all to its home site .
In a more recent controversy, 5W was retained by an organization that is advocating for independence for the province of Kosovo from Serbia, while a year earlier, 5W was retained by a group representing Serbian President Boris Tadic, to help establish an image as a friendly democracy.
References
- O'Dwyers PR Report, February 2007
- O'Dwyers Rankings
- O'Dwyers Report, Entertainment PR
- Holmes Report Agency ID
- New York Times, Brash P.R. Guy Grabs Clients, Ink, STEVEN KURUTZ, February 20, 2005
- The Armenian Reporter, 06-26-2004
- PR Watch/Israel Hasbara
- The Jewish Week Article
- PRWeek Reference
- Salt Lake City Tribune
- Adrants
- Ronn Torossian's Most Important Client Is Ronn Torossian from Gawker. August 7, 2006.
- Gawker
- Blic Online (Serbian Media's English Translation Pages)"In political fight for Kosovo, only lobbying agencies in USA are sure about profit - Yesterday for Serbia, today for independent Kosovo"
- News about 5W and Tadic