Recently someone moving to Chicago asked me for a who’s who guide to Chicago PR firms. Thanks to Crains Chicago Business, I’m posting this list of the 25 Largest Chicago PR Firms.
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As a strategic marketing and social media consultant for all types of companies, including PR firms, I advise companies to keep a watch on their competition as well form collaborative ventures to refer business that doesn’t fit and to partner up when a broader team makes sense.
My Personal Observations about Chicago’s Largest Public Relations Firms
Edelman folks seem to turn up in more places than any other firm on this list, including David Armano and Blagica Bottigliero and Archana Ramachandran and back to Leah Jones, no longer there, but the first Edelman person I met.
Adam Keats and his team at Weber Shandwick brought in their client, Oscar Mayer, to sponsor a Social Media Club Chicago event.
GolinHarris invited me to the Elysian Hotel opening, which I wrote about as a how to stage a twitter PR campaign. Interacting with their team at the event with members including Len Kendall, was engaging. It’s going to be interesting to watch GolinHarris now that Amber Porter Cox is on board as a VP of digital, dialogue team.
One of managing partners for one of these firms headed up a division at a place where I once consulted. Ketchum and CoryWest Media partnered up on a PR project for clients we had in common.
Disclosure: I am biased. I really admire those mentioned in this post.
It only takes 16 people and nine clients to make the list. Revenue ranges from $3.2 to $435 million. How do these companies stack up in social media? What do you think? That’s not on the chart.
One last thought . . . It’s interesting, to me, that I know more PR people from around the world than I know from Chicago . . .
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Top Chicago PR Firms
1. Daniel J. Edelman Inc.
200 E. Randolph St., 63rd floor, Chicago 60601
(312) 240-2600; www.edelman.com
2. Weber Shandwick
676 N. Saint Clair St., Suite 1000, Chicago 60611
(312) 988-2400; www.webershandwick.com
3. GolinHarris
111 E. Wacker Drive, 11th floor, Chicago 60601
(312) 729-4000; www.golinharris.com
4. Fleishman-Hillard Inc.
875 N. Michigan Ave., Suite 3300, Chicago 60611
(312) 751-8878; www.fleishman.com
5. Burson-Marsteller
222 Merchandise Mart Plaza., 250, Chicago 60654
(312) 596-3400; www.bm.com
6. Porter Novelli Inc.
225 N. Michigan Ave., Suite 1935, Chicago 60601
(312) 856-8888; www.porternovelli.com
7. LipmanHearne
200 S. Michigan Ave., Suite 1600, Chicago 60604
(312) 356-8000; www.lipmanhearne.com
8. Jasculca/Terman & Associates
730 N. Franklin St., Suite 510, Chicago 60654
(312) 337-7400; www.jtpr.com
9. Ketchum Inc.
200 E. Randolph St., 36th floor, Chicago 60601
(312) 228-6800; www.ketchum.com
10. Public Communications Inc
1 E. Wacker Drive, Suite 2450, Chicago 60601
(312) 558-1770; www.pcipr.com
11. S&S Public Relations Inc.
2700 Patriot Blvd., Suite 430, Glenview 60026
(847) 955-0700; www.sspr.com
12. Dig Communications
549 W. Randolph St, Suite 201, Chicago 60661
(312) 577-1754; www.digcommunications.com
13. Ruder Finn
211 E. Ontario St., Suite 1600, Chicago 60611
(312) 329-3900; www.ruderfinn.com
14. Hill & Knowlton
222 Merchandise Mart Plaza, Suite 275, Chicago 60654
(312) 255-1200; www.hillandknowlton.com
15. Ogilvy Public Relations Worldwide
350 W. Mart Center Drive, 11th floor, Chicago 60654
(312) 397-6000; www.ogilvypr.com
16. Cramer-Krasselt
225 N. Michigan Ave., 25th Floor, Chicago 60601
(312) 616-9600; www.c-k.com
17. L.C. Williams & Associates
150 N. Michigan Ave., Suite 3800, Chicago 60601
(312) 565-3900; www.lcwa.com
18. KemperLesnik
500 Skokie Blvd., 4th Floor, Northbrook 60062
(312) 755-3500; www.kemperlesnik.com
19. Gibbs & Soell PR
2800 W. Higgins Road, Suite 730, Hoffman Estates 60169
(847) 519-9150; www.gibbs-soell.com
20. Margie Korshak Inc.
875 N. Michigan Ave., Suite 1535, Chicago 60611
(312) 751-2121; www.korshak.com
21. MS&LGroup
222 Merchandise Mart Plaza, Suite 4-150, Chicago 60654
(312) 861-5200; www.mslworldwide.com
22. Res Publica Group LLC
444 N. Michigan Ave., Suite 3600, Chicago 60611
(312) 755-3535; www.respublicagroup.com
23. Zeno Group
200 E. Randolph St., Suite 5230, Chicago 60611
(312) 396-9700; www.zenogroup.com
24. Cushman/Amberg Communications
1 E. Wacker Drive, Suite 3750, Chicago 60601
(312) 263-2500; www.cushmanamberg.com
25. Tech Image
1130 Lake Cook Road, Suite 250, Buffalo Grove 60089
(847) 279-0022; www.techimage.com
Interview or Engage a Top Chicago PR Speaker and Blogger
And here’s our listing
CoryWest Media
435 Crescent, 158 Glen Ellyn, IL 60137
(630) 207-7530; www.wiredprworks.com
What other Chicago PR firms would you add to this list?
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Image: view from Michigan Avenue by Barbara Rozgonyi c2010 for www.thesociallens.com
About the Author
7 Responses to 25 Largest Chicago Public Relations Firms
Awesome list Barb!
A great post. and list … our company has has success with smaller Chicago firms…. The Kineo Group http://www.thekineogroup.com … Kemper Lesnik ….Thought Partners
You deal with more senior people than the large agencies though the price can be about the same.
nice!!!!!!!!
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This is actually a pretty good list but at first glance it appears that it might be based on size. There are tons of SMB’s out there who couldn’t afford to help support the infrastructure of some of these firms. As with what Ginny said above, we had a lot of great success a more modest Chicago PR firm — Motion PR http://motionpr.net . Kimberly and her crew have been the best!
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Tianlin Xie