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Conversations with the Inspiring Gretchen TeBockhorst

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Today we’d like to introduce you to Gretchen TeBockhorst.

Gretchen, can you briefly walk us through your story – how you started and how you got to where you are today.
Like most college graduates I know, I had a hard time finding my stride immediately after graduation. With a degree in journalism from CSU, I found myself sending out countless resumes to numerous businesses with little response. I was living with my parents while working as a bartender at an Irish pub to make ends meet. I felt completely defeated and totally bamboozled by the entire college education experience. I ended up leaning on my background in culinary arts to secure a job at a local catering company. I worked part-time as a chef de cuisine and part-time in event sales. It paid the bills, but I wasn’t in love with the hours. As one might assume, a caterer works nights, weekends and holidays. I felt extremely removed from my friends and family and knew I needed a job with a more traditional work schedule to improve my quality of life.

After sending out countless resumes (again), I was contacted by a temp agency. At the ripe age of 24, I had no idea that temp agencies existed, much less that they could help me find a job. They ended up placing me at the RE/MAX Headquarters in the Denver Tech Center, where after working through the ranks, I secured my first job in marketing in the RE/MAX approved supplier department. Finally! I had made it! I had an 8-5 job with benefits and my own cubicle. I was “officially” a success!

Fast-forward through a couple of other public relations and marketing positions and some much-needed experience, I accepted a position where my love of food and knowledge of marketing came together in one perfectly kismet package. I accepted a position with an international restaurant group as regional marketing and public relations manager. I was elated! I was working for one of the most respected restauranteurs in the world and was able to use my background in public relations and marketing to promote fabulous restaurants. It was, in fact, my dream gig.

After receiving a promotion to Director of Marketing and Public Relations, my new position allowed me to work with some of the best public relations agencies in the world. We were opening restaurants in Dubai, Hong Kong, New York, Chicago and UAE. I worked with global PR agencies to support these openings and these experiences gave me a keen understanding of what to expect from a quality public relations firm. On a local level, our Denver agencies also helped me to understand the media landscape in the Denver metro area. We were lucky enough to work with two of Denver’s best public relations agencies. Each did a phenomenal job facilitating introductions, creating partnerships and providing quality insight into the local hospitality market.

When I made the decision to go off on my own, I had the industry knowledge from the client-side combined with the media-savvy from the agency side to create results that positively impact client goals. I also saw an opportunity in the Denver market. There were public relations agencies and there were marketing agencies, but there weren’t many agencies that provided both services using an integrated approach. In 2015, Prim (public relations & integrated marketing) Communications was born with the goal of integrating marketing and public relations for hospitality clients.

Through relationships and referrals, I started getting more clients than I could take on myself. Suddenly, I was at a point at which I needed help. Using Mark Zuckerberg’s hiring strategy of “I will only hire someone to work directly for me if I would work for that person,” I found two tremendous teammates. In addition to adding value to the agency’s clients, both women have provided insight as to where Prim could improve and strategy for growing the brand. Prim wouldn’t be where it is today without these women. Almost five years later, we have a team of six remarkable publicists and marketing specialists. Each has a genuine love for what they do and continue to impress and inspire me.

Great, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
Where do I start with this one? The road to success is definitely paved with failure and challenges. I’ve had a variety of challenges throughout the years but will touch on two of the most recent.

As I mentioned above, I seemed to have hit my stride while working as the Director of Marketing for the restaurant group. I was on top of the world with a job that I loved, a loving husband and my first child. This all came crumbling down when a consultant was brought on to restructure (always a dreaded word) the company. She ended up removing my position entirely. Life as I knew it came to a screeching halt. That job was everything to me. I dedicated my life to that position and worked nights, weekends and holidays along with spending weeks away from my newborn baby boy for work travel. To top things off, we just had our most successful restaurant opening in the company’s history under my marketing and PR direction. How could I be so easily cast aside? For two weeks, I couldn’t eat, couldn’t sleep and struggled to find my self-worth.

Finally, one day, I woke up and began reaching out to my professional contacts. I reached out to local media, PR agencies, creative agencies and friends in the hospitality and PR industries. I began sending out resume after resume (again) with the hope that someone would call me back for an interview. This time around, things were a bit different from previous job-hunting experiences. Everyone wanted to talk to me about potential employment or help me in some way! I had meetings around town, lunches with agency owners and coffees with restaurant groups. It turned out that I had proven myself in the Denver community enough to position my experience as a hot commodity. It was a defining moment of my professional life and also what led me to start my own agency. This seemingly dark point was the definition of “a blessing in disguise.”

Lessons Learned? Never underestimate the power of connections. I’ve spent much of my life building and nurturing relationships with professional and personal contacts. I’ve always focused on relationships and try to have real conversations with these people. In my opinion, relationships are an integral part of professional success.

Another major blow came about a year into starting Prim. I was eight months pregnant with twins when my husband was laid off from his engineering firm. This left me as the primary breadwinner for our quickly growing family. Instead of slowing down, I went full steam ahead into business development mode. I did everything I could to overserve our current clients and began networking like a machine to retain new clients. Working at this pace while at full term with twins is taxing, to say the least.

When the twins were born, that’s when things became extremely difficult. Looking back, I’m surprised I didn’t have a nervous breakdown. I had an emergency C-section because of a placenta abruption and almost lost one of our little guys. After losing a lot of blood and spending a week and a half in the hospital, it was back to work. We didn’t have the time or the budget for a maternity leave and I hadn’t hired any team members yet. I was running on two to three hours of sleep a night and nursing two newborns while trying to run a new business. It took a toll on my marriage, along with my personal health. This was a very dark time for me. To be honest, I’ve blocked a lot of it out.

Here is the crazy part. We grew! During such a difficult time, Prim continued to flourish. I kept each of our current clients while adding three more to our roster. This also gave me the income needed to hire my first full-time employee, Larina. Thank God for Larina! Since then, we continue to grow, my husband found a fantastic engineering position (once again, his layoff was a blessing in disguise) and life is, for the most part, back to normal.

Lessons Learned? While I’m incredibly proud of overcoming this difficult period of our lives, I don’t think I’d be so business-focused if I had the chance to do it over again. I was in such a state of perseverance, that I neglected to enjoy my newborn children the way a new mother should. I put too much pressure on myself during an already trying time in life. Business will come and go. Major life moments should be cherished and savored.

what should we know about Prim Communications? What do you guys do best? What sets you apart from the competition?
Prim Communications is committed to delivering knowledgeable, media-savvy marketing, public relations and consulting services based upon superior industry knowledge and an understanding of the client and his or her customers. With a genuine excitement for what we do, Prim aims to be a trusted extension of each client’s team with results that possibly impact their business goals. We encourage creativity and enthusiasm while taking a serious approach to improving our clients’ marketing a public relations objectives.

Our services include media relations, social media, event production, influencer programming, marketing strategy, partnerships and leadership training.

At Prim, we approach our work from the client side first. With experience on the client-side, our team is comprised of hospitality experts and enthusiasts. We are uniquely positioned to understand the inner workings of a business to build a strategic marketing and PR plan that generates noticeable results. Our team does a fantastic job elevating brand awareness for restaurants, hospitality, spa, wellness and lifestyle brands.
We are publicists, strategists, tastemakers, foodies, travelers, and, above all, PASSIONATE about what we do!

Do you feel like there was something about the experiences you had growing up that played an outsized role in setting you up for success later in life?
I was lucky enough to grow up with a strong female figure as a mother. She always seemed so put together and successful in her own career path. Looking back, I can see that there were ups and downs for her but, at the time, she seemed to have it all together.

My mother grew up on a farm in northern Iowa, where they struggled to make ends meet at times and didn’t have running water until she was 13. Even then, she understood the value of education and always knew she would go to college. After graduating from high school, she was the first person in her family to get a degree. Through scholarships and working, she paid for it herself but doesn’t think her situation is all that impressive.

Growing up as her daughter, there was never any question that higher education would be a part of my life. My mother went through so much to become educated herself, I knew it would be an insult if I took my socioeconomic privileges for granted by passing on college. She also made it clear that there were certain things she would do differently if given the chance. For instance, she would have taken a risk and started an accounting firm with my father. The two were CPAs with an impressive track record. The two will always look back thinking “what if?” This gave me that extra push to take the risk and start Prim.

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Credit all photos to 5280 Productions

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