CRA PRESIDENT’S MESSAGE: February 2013

The CRA kicks off a national campaign with professional help.

As the incoming CRA national president, I am pleased to announce that the Canadian Rental Association has retained High Impact PR to undertake an aggressive media relations campaign in 2013. High Impact PR president Christopher Dabrowski has more than 10 years’ experience in the industry and specializes in social media and public relations. Chris will lead the campaign, which will target media outlets across Canada. 

High Impact PR’s expertise and network of contacts within public relations has created successful media that have resulted in wide ranging social media and traditional media exposure on behalf of clients. The firm has successfully secured earned media coverage in such media outlets as Canada AM, Breakfast Television in Edmonton, Winnipeg, Halifax and Toronto, the National Post, the Toronto Star, CBC’s The National and CBC Radio. We’re excited to work with Chris and his team throughout 2013 in helping to raise awareness and create buzz for the CRA and its members across the country.

Until recently, the CRA has not been in a financial position to try any kind of national awareness campaign. The CRA board has focused on providing services to all its members, general and associate. However, things started moving in a new direction at the International Home Show in Toronto this past November. The CRA national with the help of the Ontario CRA participated in the show, which was a terrific success. Bryan Baeumler was there and Paul Lafrance and Jim Caruk presented a seminar sponsored by DeWalt. One thing that went over really well was the promotion we had on CityTV’s Breakfast TV and Omni Television. The appearances were arranged by High Impact, which was handling PR for the show.

Our promotion had Jim Freeman from Rentquip show how to work a floor sander while mentioning several times that viewers can rent this equipment at a local CRA member store. Over the next three days, people were coming up to the booth to see the product and ask how they could use it themselves. Thanks to Jim, Paul Potvin and Dean Nasato for helping out starting at 6 a.m.

The show brought us into contact with Chris, and he told us he could do more work of this kind for the association. After some discussion and research, we decided that we should retain his services. Chris has connections all across Canada, including Quebec. This is important for the national CRA, so we can serve our members everywhere in the country.

I can personally attest to how effective Chris can be in raising awareness. When I was elected CRA national president, Chris sent press releases to all the local media. That story was picked up by the London Free Press, as well as some local Elgin county papers.

Since that exposure, I have been approached by literally dozens of people  to comment on the story.

Chris will be spreading rental awareness both nationally and locally. If you have a new hire, participate in a local home show, win an award from your chamber of commerce or have a grand opening or other event in your community, let the national CRA know via e-mail. We, along with Chris, will help promote the event. Any local, regional or national event is eligible for this assistance. This way, we hope to promote rental awareness across Canada.