One of the most inspirational running films we’ve seen is “Hood to Coast.” Co-directed by Christoph Baaden and produced by his wife, Anna Campbell, the movie looks at the world’s largest annual relay through the experiences of four teams during the training months that led up to the race, and all the way through the 197-mile, 36-hour event as they powered down from Timberline Lodge on Mount Hood, over the coastal range and down to Seaside, Ore.
The public relations challenge: Baaden had a unique distribution arrangement through Fathom Events in which the movie was set to premiere on the same night in theaters across the country. He needed help promoting it to reviewers to quickly drive awareness and ticket sales to the singular event. We speedily hatched a public relations plan and got the word out to key media with announcements and screening copies of the film. Christoph and his team produced fantastic photos, posters, website banners and more to help with the promo efforts.
Another challenge: It’s not easy to get people to watch a DVD that doesn’t have a big name attached. But this great, quirky race proved intriguing enough that the film was pre-screened by several media outlets and received outstanding reviews, including one from Variety’s Ronnie Schleib that read, “Expertly constructed, impressively lensed and surprisingly entertaining.” We leveraged kudos like this into additional media coverage and ticket sales.
Post-race cake, with icing: After its run in theaters, the film was set to come out on DVD in conjunction with the 25th anniversary of the Hood to Coast race. Christoph’s hope was to have it featured on NPR, so we put out our public relations feelers. He landed an interview with Scott Simon, in which the amazing stories of the Hood to Coast runners and teams came alive on radio, too.