Joburg in dog box, but Tshwane delivers

THIS is another from the “You could not make this up” department. My daughter, a student in Pretoria, is being driven crazy by a downstairs neighbour whose dachshund barks for 50 minutes out of every hour when its owner is not at home.

On Saturday, it reached an agonising pitch as the creature barked virtually non-stop for more than five hours. My wife found a help website for the Tshwane municipality that advised people to call the metro cops in the event of a noise disturbance.

She did. The reply: “Madam, I am sorry, we cannot help you. You see, we can go and talk to people who make noise, but we cannot talk to dogs.” True story.

Meanwhile, I had found an e-mail address for a department in the municipality that dealt with “environmental” issues. I fired off an e-mail without much hope of getting a reply, because in Joburg we have, apparently, long since given up on chasing this type (or any type) of noise offender.

Great was my surprise, then, when I received a reply, before 10am on Monday. The e-mail had been seen and forwarded and acted on first thing that morning. I was amazed – even more so because I am still waiting for our rubbish removal service, Pikitup, to respond to a complaint I made in December.

Then I saw elsewhere on the Tshwane website that the municipality’s marketing slogan is: “A better place to live.” I must say, people, it is good to see a government authority living up to its marketing and brand promise, as opposed to mocking it through its day-to-day delivery, as we regularly do here in Joburg, “A world-class African city”.

An Orchid to the Tshwane municipality for living up to its brand promise.

There is an amusing TV ad running for Kia’s special deals on its vehicles. It’s simple: animated chunks of clay that form and reform into numbers and offers.

It reminds me of the entrancing Wallace and Gromit TV series, a favourite of my kids (and mine) . It works. It entertains and gets the message across. So an Orchid to Kia.

Public relations people seem to be ending up in my sights quite often these days for getting things wrong or not making the most of opportunities.

First in line for an Onion this week is Kerry Oliver, of The Lime Envelope. I am somewhat reluctant to hand out this award because Oliver has been professional in all other interactions with me.

But the release she sent out last week cannot escape comment.

First, it had a silly, breathless headline about “SA judge set to take Dubai Lynx by storm”. Really? A South African, no matter how good or experienced, is not going to take that advertising awards ceremony by storm – unless she shoots someone. Rule No 1 in good communication: Don’t gush. It’s demeaning and it makes me wonder, Why all the hoopla?

However, the worst thing about the release was that it arrived at 8.30 in the morning on March 9. And no attempt had been made to change the future tense in which it was written.

All of the copy spoke about how Joanina Pastoll, creative director for Cross Colours South Africa, “will” do this and “will” do that.

The last line read: “She will be bringing this passion to the festival, which will culminate in an awards ceremony on 9 March.” In other words, Pastoll had been in Dubai for almost three days before this release landed on my desk.

That’s a joke and they get an Onion. I suspect, as happens so often in the PR business, that client dithering prevented the release from being signed off and sent out as it should have been a week earlier.

Another unforgivable PR practice is not checking releases thoroughly before sending them out. And, just as bad, sending out a previous, uncorrected version of a release.

This was Digby Wesson’s irritating faux pas a few weeks ago with a release he sent out on behalf of Kusudalweni Lodge & Spa. First of all, search as I might through the contents of the release, I could find no clue to the location of the lodge – other than that it was in “the bushveld”. I had to go on to the website to find out that information – Basic PR error No 1.

Basic PR error No 2 was this line: “The complete all-inclusive package is R00000. Please let me have the price,” and a line below that: “Caption awaiting the images.”

Not good enough, Digby. You should know better and be more careful, so an Onion for sloppiness goes to you and your agency, Digger Marketing.