Crisis Communications

The political controversy surrounding the proposed sale of U.S. port operations to a foreign buyer required strategic crisis communication and political outreach. The seller, a British maritime seafaring company, retained Weber Merritt in the middle of the political storm to respond to criticism and to present the facts to Congress, the media and the public. A rapid-response war room was developed to disseminate the facts to the national and local media in the port cities and respond to negative articles and comments by detractors. In the six U.S. markets where port operations are managed by the British company, Weber Merritt also assembled a local political team to begin meeting with local elected officials, community leaders and the media to explain that port operations and its management team would not change under new ownership and that U.S. ports would remain secure. We facilitated port tours for the media to demonstrate port operations with a first hand view of how the ports and security protocols work. Our local efforts were aimed at educating local authorities and solidifying relationships previously forged by the company’s port operations in each locale.

When the foreign buyer announced that it would divest the North American port operations to a U.S.-based entity, thus ending the immediate political controversy, Weber Merritt arranged a teleconference call for the seller’s executives to make the announcement. In one afternoon, more than 110 press calls were fielded by Weber Merritt’s media team resulting in more than 20 print stories and mentions on CNN, MSNBC and Fox National as well as interviews with National Public Radio and Voice of America. Weber Merritt remains PR counsel to the British seller throughout the remainder of the company’s sale of its North American port operations.