Punching Out Press Releases

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career, internship, public relations, student, travel, USA

Press releases are an intrinsic part of public relations. Not only are they a major way we communicate with our target publics but also a way that we build the brand awareness and create talkability about the products we represent in the community.

At Promo Communications I have been working on multiple press releases for multiple clients. Here are five things to know, that I have learned about when writing a press release.

1. Leading the way
The lead is the most important paragraph of the press release and in my (somewhat limited) experience it is also the paragraph that gets rewritten and edited the most. The lead, or the opening paragraph, is the one that is going to hook the journalist who will hopefully publish the release as well as hook the consumer. It shows why the press release is newsworthy and contains the five W’s. Who; What; When; Where and Why. These W’s are a PR practitioners best-friends and they all have to be contained within a couple of sentences in the lead paragraph.

Sarah-Jane, senior account director at Promo, said that when writing the lead the first thing you should do is write two sentences that contains the five W’s and then once you have all that information you can rewrite it to make it flow. Thinking of a lead as if you are the journalist is the best way to do it so you are sure you are writing something newsworthy. When I studied journalism at UTS I wrote a lot of practice leads for stories and writing a lead or a press release is the same concept.

2. Juggling is a skill
Working or interning in an agency means you have multiple clients and that means you probably have multiple press releases and multiple deadlines.
Time management and juggling the time you spend on each client is one of the difficult aspects of working in an agency. It is very easy to get absorbed in press releases and before you know it you’ve spent hours rephrasing, rewording and rewriting a release that was probably pretty good to begin with.
Sarah Jane’s advice- give yourself a time-limit. I personally like to make lists of what I want to achieve and the time is has to be done by. I like organising myself that way. Organisation is the key to getting press releases written, edited and finished promptly.

3. Different client, different language
Agency life means having different clients and managing all their expectations. When writing a press release this is not different. Different kinds of clients will have different language styles that press releases have to be written in. I guess this is where experience really helps because this is the part of press release writing I find most difficult. Jumping between different clients and different press release writing styles is really hard because it means constantly changing not only what you write, but how you write it as well! As they say, practise makes perfect!

4. Editing the copy

Editing press releases is really important. Sometimes there is so much information that it is hard to cut down the release to be succinct and appealing to journalists.
I find editing my own work is not the easiest thing to do but is really important so practice, practice, practice!

5. Picking your media
The last part of press release writing is picking the relevant media that you want to send it to. Finding specific media personnel that fit the story and who’s publication is appropriate for the press release is really important in maintaining positive relationships with the media, as well as getting the best earned coverage for your client.

Photo-Shoots for Collateral!

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aspen, Colorado, internship, marketing, Photo Shoot, public relations, travel, USA, Working

My internship at Related is going fabulously and every day is a different challenge and new experience. We have been working really hard on updating all our collateral. The brochures, fliers and compendium pieces all have to be kept up to date. Looking at the photos we thought that we were missing some key shots of the Viceroy Snowmass, so, we set up a photo-shoot!

Photo-shoot day was a fun day at work, even if it was a Saturday. Timing has been difficult because we really want to be as authentic as possible and get the best shot. Coordinating with mother nature can be hard. The first time we organised the shoot there wasn’t enough snow. The second time the shoot was on it started to blizzard. So this is our third and final chance at a perfect photo. The weather cooperated, the sky was blue and there was perfect crisp white snow on the ground.

Rustling up models at the last minute is tough but luckily my boss Leticia has some good looking friends from different demographics. We had a young couple and a baby; the nuclear family and a bunch of girlfriends.

It was actually a really fun day. We did shots on the front drive, the ski valet and in the restaurant. All the “models” were great and we paid them with free breakfast at EightK!

We were all looking great in our ski gear and after the photographer shouted “That’s a wrap” (which reminded me of America’s Next Top Model), we went out and enjoyed our Saturday on Snowmass Mountain.

We got the photos sent to us on Monday and they turned out really well! Now we just have to decide which ones are the ‘winners’ that will be going into all the brochures. Keeping collateral up to date is important for showing our clients that we are current and constantly moving with the market. This week’s project is going to be a full edit of all the Related Snowmass collateral, it’s a big job, at least we have the photos done!

At the bus stop on my way to the photo-shoot! What a perfect blue-bird day!

Seeing with Cision

My internship at Promo Communications is going so well and every day I seem to enjoy it more.

The other intern Sydney is going back to College so it’s just me working now. I have started getting really involved in using the public relations and marketing software Cision. Working with industry software is important for a variety of reasons. Firstly this software is smart. Using a key words system it scans the Internet and national media for articles or hits constituting those key words. Basically it helps us see what is being said about our clients in the media and better yet if our campaign strategies are really working.

From these  types of software we can find out how many people the article is reaching from the calculated distribution, the publicity value of the piece and then I am able to calculate the public relations value of the piece. For print coverage, an article is worth about three times as much as colour advertisement in the same spot would cost. This is because articles written by journalists or bloggers are far more interactive and engaging to the reader than straight advertising. Not only does it grip the reader into a story, but it also means that the viewer is taking longer and processing the information, where as advertisements usually are just skimmed over and not read deeply.

Cision is such an important tool for public relations professionals, it is just one of many types of software that do the same thing. It is particularly great for me to be working on it because I am learning a lot about how this kind of technology helps to put a value on the work of public relations, and how it really contributes to a brand and brand awareness.

Cision is also an intrinsic tool because it enables us to search the program like a database and find information about media personnel that are directly relevant to certain press releases. This is particularly good because it helps us send press releases to diverse and appropriate journalists, which in turn increases the likelihood of our release being turned into coverage.

To have some experience using this kind of software is so important and I am enjoying becoming more comfortable using the software and discerning which ‘hits’ are actually our coverage and which ones are not actually related to the client.

Well Travelled Burgers and Custom Slippers: A Crash Course in Last Minute Event Planning

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aspen, event, event planning, intern, internal communications, marketing, Peter Luger, public relations, snowmass, USA, work experience

I have been working at Related, my second internship, for a few weeks now- but to follow the lyrics of my favourite Sound of Music song…Let’s start at the very beginning.

My first few days at Related has to be one for the books. I have been thrown straight in the deep end, which I love. Here’s how it went…

Monday

My very first day.

Pretty much as soon as I walked in Leticia told me that she has been liaising with a high end Brazilian travel agent. This guy, I’ll call him Paulo*, is not your average FlightCenter kind of agent but the go-to man for the Brazilian rich and famous. Leticia has been trying to put an event together for Paulo to bring his wealthy friends to, to give them a chance to have a look at the show room condominiums and give the sales people a chance to get the information out and hopefully make a sale. We just need to get these people through the door. Though this might sound easy, invitations haven’t been sent out yet and guess when the party is scheduled for? Wednesday. We have 2 days, the two of us, two lovely Brazilian real-estate agents and an event that has to be perfect.

Me with Cris and Deborah, the wonderful Brazilian brokers from Coelho Da Fonseca who made our event fantastic!

For this party, we have prepared for about forty people to attend. Paulo wants his friends to have an ‘all American’ experience. One of his stipulations for him to bring his friends, is that we fly in Peter Luger burgers from New York. Yes, you read correctly. Fly in burgers from New York. Just this is costing a whopping $US75 a head. In my personal opinion, would the Brazilian guests notice the difference between the jet-setting patties and ones we make in Colorado? Somehow I don’t think so, but we’re doing it anyway and hopefully it creates a talking point about our dedication!

Tuesday

The party is tomorrow and Aspen is experiencing a complete cold snap, which seems funny because it’s a ski town but it’s even cold for here. This morning at the bus stop was -4 degrees Fahrenheit. Freezing isn’t the word for it. It’s thirty degrees colder than freezing. Paulo is really wants the gathering around the pool. Because of the frigid cold, we don’t have facilities to heat and serve food and keep the guests warm around the pool. So we try and come up with the next best solution because -4 degrees with a wind-chill factor of God-only-knows-what, will not be a pleasant customer experience to hang around the pool in. I suggested that we serve hot chocolate around the pool give people customized Viceroy Residences slippers to change into when they take their ski boots off, and come inside to eat the Peter Luger burgers. Paulo agrees and this is a good example of how sometimes events can’t go exactly how you want them, but compromising so that everyone is happy is always the key.

It is the day before the party and invites are being printed, folded, addressed and sent in a kind of mad Brazilian conga line. Every Brazilian guest at any hotel in the Snowmass area received an invite and this is not even including Paulo’s friends. The Brazilian realtors, Cris and Deborah, sent the invitations to their friends in Brazil, who posted the invite to the lunch in the social section of a well-known Brazilian online magazine and on Facebook. So every Brazilian in Aspen, and perhaps the whole world would have seen this invitation. I have been warned about putting invitations on the Internet; we didn’t want this to be a Brazilian Cory Worthington repeat! However we could see that our little party planned for forty was rapidly becoming bigger than Ben Hur. We warned the Viceroy kitchen they might have to prepare more burgers. In the end more people mean more buyers so the added stress is definitely worth it in the end!

Wednesday

The day is here. And of course the fire pits outside were not working, thank God for on-call engineering. As guests arrived it seemed to be going well as the party-goers were escorted by the ski valet upstairs to the rooms especially set up for them in the EightK restaurant. These Brazilian guests had a wonderful gourmet burger lunch, talked to the realtors in Portuguese and visited the show rooms. Paulo decided on-the-spot that the weather was actually good enough to sit outside, even though that was not what was previously discussed and agreed on. However as a team, we have a ‘can-do’ attitude. The food and beverage department wasn’t thrilled with us changing the venue of the party half way through the event, while it was stressful at the time, the important thing is out guests were really happy.

It can be challenging working with guests that don’t speak the same language as you. Unfortunately speaking only English and having 150 Portuguese-speaking guests can be a little bit tricky, be we worked through it. In any case the rest of the day was trying to escort burgers from the restaurant to downstairs without upsetting other patrons. I have never ridden in an elevator so many times in the course of 3 hours. It must have been fifty trips. In the end I think it was fine. And perhaps it looked more like a shambles from where I was standing behind-the-scenes than it would have from the party guest’s point of view. Our team apologised personally to every person from food and beverage as our “small gathering of 40 maximum” turned into a party in two different venues for over 150. They did an absolutely amazing job and we held it together with great success. We have some high-interest prospects for the sales teams so hopefully we get a buyer out of our burger party.

After everyone had left to go back on the slopes and finish their ski day and all our apologies to food and beverage were done, the team sat down to take deep breaths and have a burger and a glass of wine. We deserved it, the party was a success.

*name changed for privacy

Eavesdropping on a Pitch

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agency, aspen, Colorado, internship, pitching, public relations, student, travel, university, USA, UTS, work experience

As the intern, clearly I was not invited to participate in a client pitch. It could be argued that pitching is the most integral part of agency life. Whether it be public relations, advertising or any other kind of agency situation, successful pitching is key to a successful business.

Pitching to a client for their business is important on many levels. The most obvious, is that you need to pitch to have a chance at the business. However there are other nuances of pitching that are also integral to the overall relationship with the client.

Firstly an establishment of what the client expects from the public relations practitioners is an important base to start on. Some pitches follow very strict client-specific briefs, whilst others, like the one I was able to hear through the wonderfully thin walls of the office, was more of a casual and mutual conversation between PR practitioners and the potential client.

Secondly, the pitch not only sets up initial expectations of the client but also provides the practitioner with a foundation for a relationship with the client. If the pitch is memorable and the practitioners and the client can communicate effectively with each other, the pitch can be the foundation of how the relationship between client and practitioner will progress.

Even though I wasn’t able to be in the room while the pitch was taking place, the audio version from next door was the next best thing! I was able to see how the practitioners engaged with the client, expressed their ideas for future public relations strategies and explained to the potential client why our agency is the perfect fit for that particular product.

I’m not in room with the pitch, but next door is the next best thing!

Like any kind of pitching, Promo Communications will be competing with other public relations agencies for this client’s business. Nothing is set in stone until they have signed on the dotted line. From what I can gather, listening to the office next door, is that the client seemed both enthusiastic and impressed by the work of Sarah Jane, Maureen and Damien. So maybe very soon we will have another client to add to our books!

This is the first piece of advice I’ve ever posted, for all you interns out there, find a good place to listen to pitching, it’s the best ‘second hand’ learning you’ll be able to find!

I love my job in Aspen, even the drive to work is picturesque!

Vogue, Vanity Fair, Country Living and The New Yorker. All in the name of brainstorming.

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aspen, brainstorming, Colorado, intern, Magazines, media, PR, public relations, travel, USA, Vanity Fair, Vogue

Circulation of a product is the biggest thing that we can do as public relations practitioners to boost the knowledge of the product and the success of the product within its industry. Agencies pitching and promoting their client to relevant media outlets is how a product gets featured in a magazine, whether it be a feature or a “top ten” list. And that my cyber-space friends, is PR gold.

The office at Promo Communications at the moment looks like a printing press has been running for two months straight. Which, it basically has. Literally hundreds of magazines from across the country and internationally have been flown in and have accumulated over the Christmas and holiday busy period and no one has been able to get to them. These current issues of every magazine from fashion to interior design to travel magazines, you name it, we’ve got it, are all sitting here and waiting to be read.

Just one of the corners of the office that houses the piles and piles of magazines! I can’t fit all of them in one shot!

This week the other intern Sydney (what a coincidence her name is) and I have to go through all these magazines, find regular sections and figure out how we can pitch any one of our clients to that magazine. It is all about exposure. If we can get a wine label into Vogue, that attracts a completely different audience than if we got the same label into Country Living. Both of these magazines have very high and very comparable monthly circulations with numbers like 1,222,373 and 1,641,000 respectively. However I would put money on the fact that they are being read by very different target audiences. So if we can find a unique way to get the products into both magazines, well it would be safe to say we would have significantly expanded our coverage.

The other intern Sydney and I are trying to get through the piles of magazines! We are getting creative with story ideas!

Pitching to the media however can be a delicate thing. It is important not to waste journalist’s time by pitching stories that have no relevance to the publication. Back to our Vogue and Country Living example, if we pitched “Sauvignon Blanc and Haute Couture: A couple to die for” to Country Living, not only would it not make any sense to the magazine itself but it is also completely irrelevant to the readership. The same scenario would occur if we pitched a story called “Rustic Rendezvous’: Hearty American Meals and their Matching Local Wines” to Vogue. Anna Wintour would probably roll her eyes and never hear a pitch from us again. (Admittedly, the likelihood of that story getting to Anna Wintour’s desk is resoundingly low.)

The point is that brainstorming for story pitch ideas is creative and fun! The more out-of-the-box we can be the better. The idea is to fit our products into all sorts of media frameworks. At the moment I’m trying to think of the best way to get our Aspen hotel clients featured in a magazine called “Budget Travel”. See what I mean about creative, wish me luck!

I will be reading for days! #internlife

Why have one when you can have two?

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aspen, internal communications, internship, media, new job, public relations, skiing, travel, USA, UTS

This is usually my motto regarding caramel TimTams and handbags, though I suppose it could also apply to …internships?

This story shows that making friends and expanding your network really does pay off.

I have been juggling my internship at Promo Communications with trying to get as many hours on the fabulous slopes of Aspen Mountain as I can. I have to say I’ve been doing well at juggling the two and I’ve been having a fantastic time at it! But as fate would have it, in a mountain restaurant in ski gear, I was introduced to one of the internal public relations practitioners of a company called Related.

Related is a real estate development and asset management company. This company owns basically the whole of Snowmass Colorado (about 20 minutes from Aspen and is another great ski area), including the Base Village, the Viceroy building as well as other condominium complexes. It is also one of the biggest asset development and management companies in the US with its head office in New York and offices all over the world. Once I met Leticia who works with Viceroy Residences, one of Related’s assets in Snowmass, I told her I was interning at an agency in Aspen, Promo Communications, and she wondered if I was interested in applying for another internship. Of course I said absolutely, we exchanged details. Within three days I had an interview and, guess what, I got the job!

The only way to put this is that this ridiculously good luck, coming to Aspen and having the opportunity to not only have one great internship experience, but two!! Well I couldn’t have asked for anything more! But it gets better, there is no conflict of interest between my two internships. This is because I am not working for two different agencies. Promo Communications is a public relations agency, meaning that the company is contracted to look after all different clients, Related is the other end of public relations. The public relations practitioners that work at Related are only involved with their own company and would deal with all aspects of the public relations of their company. Working internally in a company, especially one as large as Related, means that the internal PR which is basically concentrating on communicational messaging within the company itself, is very important. The PR practitioners would also focus on the external public relations, which comprises of more traditional public relations techniques like communicating the company’s key messages to those external to the company itself, the target public.

My job working with Leticia at Related is promoting the Viceroy Residencies, wholly owned ski-in ski-out condominiums, to investors and potential buyers.

The opportunity to gain experience in both dominions of public relations is unbelievable and though the fact that I’m taking on another internship will significantly cut into my ski time, the benefits of this kind of experience is actually unbelievable! I feel incredibly fortunate to be able to have this opportunity to learn and think I will benefit tremendously from having the unusual ability to work on the reflecting sides of public relations simultaneously.

Is there a message to this post? Absolutely! Your network of people is the most valuable thing you have going for yourself when it comes to building your own opportunities!

My new office at the Viceroy Residences! Not a bad view!

New York City Media Visits!

Tags

aspen, internship, media, public relations, travel, USA, UTS, work experience

Don’t get too excited, I’m just the intern; there is no way I’m going!

The two senior public relations consultants at Promo Communications are heading off for a week-long media visit in only a few days. As our portfolio of clients are starting to think about what they want to achieve in terms of public relations in 2013, we as their agency, must also start forward thinking to how 2013 is going to pan out. Thinking ahead to media opportunities in the summer and achieving maximum coverage for the notoriously ‘low’ season for aspen businesses, now is the time to put our heads together and entice our markets to engage in our client’s products year round.

Media visits entail a kind of ‘media hopping’ to engage in the relationships, some new and some longstanding, we have with journalists, event planners and other important stakeholders. Armed with media kits, the PR practitioners aim to pitch stories, ideas and generate press for the client or even just build on relationships so that generating press in future months is as feasible as possible. For me as an intern, media visits mean a lot of preparation work for the trip!

MEDIA KITS

A media kit is a package of information that practitioners will give to journalists or other representatives that provides as much information or assistance possible for the media or media representatives. These kits hopefully help the people we are visiting to be engaged in our product and hopefully generate positive coverage for the client.

In the good old days, according to Sarah Jane, PR practitioners put together hard copy packages for the journalists. Now, in the hyper-engaged and hyper-digital world that we live in, one double-sided page is all the information we give journalists, as well as other people, that PR practitioners will meet with to generate business. Any further information is then sent in follow-up emails. As the intern I have to make sure that the primary document that will be given in hardcopy, is as professional and as meaningful as possible. Trying to fit all the most important information only on one page is quite a task but one that can really define how the receiver reacts, to not only the pitched story but also the product as a whole. Because this job is so important, naturally it is under the very close scrutiny of my boss!

Other secondary documents that will be in the press kit are delivered digitally. These also have to be compiled before the media trip as some journalists and editors will enquire about this information immediately.

ITINERARY

Organising the itinerary for any trip is important, but for a trip like this, where Maureen and Sarah Jane are squeezing in as many visits in as possible, the timetabling is even more imperative. Timetabling, though administrative, was interesting for me because I have been able to become familiar with the roles of the journalists they are speaking to and what impact these media personnel could have on our clients.

This week has been a learning experience that has reinforced the importance of face-to-face conversations, continual relationship building and creating an environment that best suits our client’s chances for future media coverage.

Office supplies! Bert’s Bees lip-balm is my favourite thing for battling the cold weather outside and then the air-conditioning in the office!

First day jitters: New year, new job, new opportunities!

Tags

aspen, internship, public relations, skiing, travel, university, USA, work experience

2013 has begun with a fabulous fall of fresh powder as well as my very first day as an intern at Promo Communications.

Since my arrival in Aspen Colorado six days ago, my itinerary has mostly been filled with getting my ski legs back and parading my new purple K2 skis and matching jacket down the perfectly groomed runs of Snowmass Mountain.

Perfect bluebird day on Snowmass Mountain, we had a few inches of powder the night before so the conditions were perfect!

However as the New Year has begun, so too must my purpose of this trip. This week was the first week of my internship. Promo communications, located in the heart of Aspen, is a boutique public relations firm that has agreed to take me on three days a week until the end of February. Being my first experience in the ‘real world’ of public relations I was actually very nervous. I changed outfits twice. Opting for a high waisted black skirt and a baby pink sweater I thought that perhaps I had hit the office attire described ‘aspen business casual’ perfectly on the head. Turns out I may have been a little more business than causal as the requirements for dressing for business in this town are a little more relaxed. Having discovered this pretty quickly, I’m fairly relieved as I nearly froze to death on the bus in my skirt!

My first job in the mornings is to pick up the two local Aspen papers, The Aspen Times and The Aspen Daily News. What my tutors and lecturers at the University of Technology Sydney, UTS, have taught me and what my first week as an intern had reinforced, is that what my textbooks call ‘environmental scanning’ is extremely important. Environmental scanning or as my mentor at Promo Communications calls it ‘media scanning’ is basically scanning relevant media for stories that may effect our clients in any way either directly or indirectly. The local Aspen newspapers are the most immediate source of direct information that could concern clients belonging to Promo Communications as this company deals mostly with clients in the Aspen-Snowmass area. However there are other systems to more broadly negotiate the relevance of issues or stories featured in the media by use of software that scans the Internet and accredited media outlets for files or ‘hits’, that coincide with our client or themes and issues we are looking for

Starting my day with a media scan of the local papers, The Aspen Times and The Aspen Daily News.

Environmental scanning is both necessary and important because:

a)    It is necessary to know what is currently in the media that has any kind of relationship with a client. This gives public relations practitioners the ability to either generate a positive story for the client in relation to the current issue or prepare the client for problems that they may face because of the reported issue or story in the media.

b)   If our client appears in the media specifically, it makes sense to inform them of this reportage. If it is a positive media appearance (fingers crossed!), the client should be aware so that they can act accordingly. For example a client might update their website, post the article on various social media outlets or inform the wider brand or client employees of this coverage. If the said coverage by a media outlet is not so positive, then the client must be aware so they can act appropriately or respond directly to the issue.

These magazines are my daily reading list! What a hard job….but it is actually very important for the clients!

I personally enjoy the ‘environmental’ or ‘media’ scanning. It’s intern work because it is time consuming and frankly doesn’t take a huge amount of brainpower. However it can also be really interesting. Today while scanning the media, I saw a four-page feature article on Aspen Village in the summer featured in Gourmet Traveller Australia. This piece was generated by my boss and is of a high public relations value. It has a high value because of the size and length of the feature as well as the fact that the media outlet, Gourmet Traveller Australia, is deemed of very high credibility to the travel industry and our target audience. This kind of media appearance is, according to PR practitioner at Promo Communications, and my boss Sarah Jane, “public relations gold” because its not only fabulous for the client, but justifies to the client the importance of public relations to their brand. It is also funny that literally in the first week in my job in America I was reading an Australian Magazine!

All in all it has been an exciting first week and I’m really looking forward to continuing. I feel like I have learned a lot already!

Follow me on Instagram at @s_templeman and on Twitter @s_templeman for other updates about my Aspen intern experience!

As for the weekend I hope it snows over night because I’m hitting the slopes tomorrow!!

Tis the season…to be interning.

Tags

aspen, internship, skiing, travel, university, UTS

As a student at The University of Technology Sydney (UTS) studying a Bachelor of Communication majoring in Public Communication: Public Relations, the primary focus is not only to do well in every exam and assessment but also to prove your skills in the real world of PR, as an intern. The count down begins until my first real life taste of the world of public relations begins. In Aspen. The land of the rich, famous and fabulous is my destination on December 27. I am not famous or particularly fabulous but I am very rich …in enthusiasm! So this summer instead of lounging around on a beach slip, slop and slapping on the sunscreen, I will be braving the chill and charm of Aspen, Colorado.

My internship, three days a week at a boutique Public Relations Firm Promo Communications, is my first interning experience. I would be lying if I said I wasn’t nervous. As much as I love my course at UTS there is no way to tell how different real life work will be. There is also no way to tell to what extent I am prepared for this, especially as my chosen internship is half way across the globe.

From what I can understand, public relations in America will be a slightly different learning experience than an internship in Australia. From the assortment of lecturers and tutors at University I’ve talked to, it seems that public relations, especially in the realm of social media, is a few years more progressive overseas. Apart from the obvious, that I have never done an internship before, there are a few things about this American internship that I’m not entirely sure about. Firstly I have been informed that the dress code for Promo Communications is “Aspen business casual”. Is Aspen business casual entirely different form Sydney business casual? Actually, in all seriousness I would like a definition on what business casual even means, regardless of the city. In any case I am positive this once in a lifetime Aspen internship opportunity will be fantastic and I am excited to share it on this blog!

Feel free to also follow me on Instagram at @s_templeman and Twitter @s_templeman.

A three day a week internship seems more than ideal, what will I do with my other four days of the week? Eat a s’more, drink some hot chocolate and ski the famous Aspen powder!

Only a few more weeks to go until January 2, my very first day.

Until then,

Merry Christmas!

Leaving summer in the sun for Aspen winter wonderland…some of us have it tough!