Crayton: Welcome to Reputation Matters. So if you’re in the world of public relations, there’s some iconic names you’ve surely heard of, Burson, Goldman, Fleishman, or in advertising, Temerlin McClain and Tracy Locke. But there’s another name, another icon who is our guest today on Reputation Matters, and that’s Stan Levenson. He’s the co-founder of Levenson & Hill, Levenson & Brinker Public Relations. He’s worked with entertainment giants like Columbia Pictures, Paramount, Warner Brothers, musical legends like Pat Boone and Lawrence Welk and corporate giants like American Airlines, Papa John’s, Chili’s. The list goes on and on and on. And he also just had his 90th birthday. Stan Levenson, you are a legend and an icon in reputation management. Thank you so much for joining us today on Reputation Matters.

Stan: Thank you. Privilege to be with you. Thank you.

Crayton: You’re a friend and a gentleman by all accounts. You have such a fascinating story, really 50 years more than that in the public relations and reputation management business. It started really, you graduated from University of Michigan and then went into the Army. Tell us about your experience.

Stan: Drafted into the Army not long after graduation. It’s a peacetime army in the ’50s, and had a very productive experience there.

Crayton: What’d you do?

Stan: Two years I was drafted. Well, after basic training, I was assigned to the public information office of the U.S. Army at each base. PIO is what is how it’s referenced.

Crayton: What were your duties as public information officer?

Stan: Working with visiting congressmen and generals and VIPs to show them around the base. The engineer school was quite well noted. We also had the opportunity to interact and work with some of the people in the base that wanted to learn more about that occupation. It was very worthwhile reporting on different events and activities being in the information service.

Crayton: If you had to advise the military these days on their reputation or media management, in hindsight now some 60 years later, anything you’d be telling your commanding officer now?

Stan: Pay attention.

Crayton: Yeah.

Stan: I think there’s opportunities to recognize your role. If you want to stand up and be more outspoken, you’re out of place. They think you’re really not following your role as a staff worker. You’ve got to pay attention to the culture of the U.S. Army or any other military.

Crayton: You ended up selling and promoting records, Dot records, Pickwick International, Motown.

Stan: Yes. Weber called and said, “Hey, I need you to join us. There’s a big disc jockey conference coming to Miami, and there’s some of our execs I wanted to meet you, want you to meet them, and let’s see what develops.”
Joined Weber at this conference. They hired me to work with Weber throughout the country. We called on disc jockeys and music stores making sure those Dot artists, again, this was before rock and roll, our big artists were Lawrence Welk, Pat Boone, who was still at the University of North Texas, Billy Vaughan, Gale Storm, all the old timers. Weber and I worked for Dot in Memphis. Then they sent us to New Orleans for six months, and then they said, “We need you in Dallas, we’re not happy with our distributor there. Want you to pull the line, open up your own warehouse, and grow a distributorship.” So that’s how I got to Dallas in the late ’50s.

Crayton: So your job, let me make sure I got this straight, was to take the records and make sure that disc jockeys had them in hand and actually-

Stan: And played them.

Crayton: …played them, right?

Stan: Yeah.

Crayton: I mean, what an interesting case study in how sales and distributorship and public relations and public affairs kind of all fit together.

Stan: Yes, they did. They did. It was just great training. I loved it, and we learned a lot and were really most successful. There was a great DJ here named Ron Chapman, KVIL, KLIF. And Gordon McLendon, by the way, was a client at KLIF.

Crayton: We’re shooting here in Dallas-Fort Worth, Texas, so our listeners know. So many of them here local know Ron Chapman.

Stan: Ron and I became close friends. I had a new Billy Vaughan record and I got pressured to really pitch it. So I went to Ron and I said, “I’ve got what I think… ” And this was genuine, said, “I think I’ve got a real hit.” He said, “So?” I said, “Well, if you listen to it, let me service you and play it on the air, I’ll give you the exclusive to breaking it. I won’t go to any other radio station or disc jockey. You got it?” He said, “Okay, I’ll try it. I’ll check it out.” So I did. And he said, “Yeah, it’s got… ” Love Letters in the Sand, Billy Vaughan sold 40 million copies.

Crayton: Wow. Wow. Wow.

Stan: And I’ve got some great correspondents back from Ron, who’s remembered it.

Crayton: What was it like distributing for Motown in the heyday?

Stan: The best.

Crayton: Yeah?

Stan: The best. I mean, that was early ’60s, so Stevie Wonder, The Supremes were great, and we had a great experience with The Supremes too.

Crayton: Got to know him, got to work with them personally?

Stan: Yeah. By this time I was working with them, I also had some opportunities to do some freelance work, and I picked up a couple freelance clients while I was still selling records. But I wanted to expand beyond record sales but include music sales as well. So I had the opportunity to work with the Astrodome Jazz Festival in Houston featuring The Supremes and Judy Garland on the same show. Picked up The Supremes, but having a flavor for showbiz, we got a high school band to be at the airport with us. I had my Stetson hats to present to the ladies and the high school band played Welcome to Texas.

Crayton: In so many ways you’re selling yourself, you’re selling trust with both the DJs as well as these major artists. What was your approach around reputation management? Did you have a credo, a philosophy?

Stan: Yes. I think it’s important to recognize that reputation is not an internal matter that you pitch. It’s a perception among your key audiences, what they think of you and how they learn about you. So it’s very, very important from my perspective to have an attitude of giving and sharing and a genuine interest in being proactive to earn a reputation, not just to think you have it and peddle it. And that requires what I call a you attitude, [inaudible 00:09:51] you attitude. So if you’re really interested in not just informing people about you and what you support and your values, but if you want to be proactive and relate to their needs and interests, not just inform, but relate, then you move it on. You’ve got to have a genuine interest in being of service, being service-minded. And you are-

Crayton: Well, you’re trying to say that. I aspire to be like that. You’re a role model for sure. But I think that what I hear you saying is, if it’s just about the sale and not about the relationship, you’re really missing out.
Stan: Exactly.

Crayton: You opened up your own public relations firm, Stan Levenson& Associates here in Dallas, Texas. What were you doing?

Stan: Well, while working for Motown, I picked up some side opportunities and decided then that I’d open my own firm, just me. And around that time, in 1962, I met my wife, Barbara. She was a sophomore or a freshman at the University of Texas in Austin and got sick with Mono.

Crayton: She did or you did?

Stan: She did. She did. And she was home for a semester and got well. A mutual friend of ours called her mother, a mutual friend of her mother’s, and said, “Barbara needs to meet this guy.” Barbara was going with another guy and she really wasn’t that interested. But her mother said, “Sure, send him over.” So Barbara heard about this and called a lot of her friends to be at the house when I came over, and I did. Didn’t really get to talk to her much, but it was nice. I was 28 at the time and glad. But she was polite, but I left because I had something very important coming up the next day.

Crayton: What was that?

Stan: I was working for Dot at the time, and there was a motion picture being made with Pat Boone and a young lady by the name of Ann-Margaret.

Crayton: Yeah, of course.

Stan: And Ann-Margaret was doing some touring, and Dot asked her to come to Dallas, “We’ve got a guy there that will take good care of you.”

Crayton: And that was you.

Stan: Yeah. So I was glad to get home from my date at Barbara’s home to meet her and was meeting Ann when she arrived at the airport. Again, the Stetson hat and-

Crayton: The whole deal.

Stan: responsible for getting the media out there in advance. So even when I got home that night before, I followed up on all the media and made sure they knew-

Crayton: Made sure they were coming.

Stan: Made sure they knew what flight at the airport. This was at Love Field. It went great. So I picked Ann up and brought her back to the hotel and we had some time together. But in the meantime, Barbara’s father that next day that I was over there, was watching the six and 10 o’clock news and he says, “Hey, Barbara, come in here.” He said, “Isn’t that the guy that was here last night with Ann-Margaret?” She said, “What?”

Crayton: She had a little competition maybe.

Stan: So Barbara got a little more interested.

Crayton: So you’ve got Ann-Margaret to thank for your-

Stan: I do.

Crayton: And if I remember correctly, there might be a little bit of a resemblance between Ann-Margaret and Barbara Levenson.

Stan: Well, I dated Barbara for a short time later, three weeks to be exact, and I asked her to marry me.

Crayton: Wow.

Stan: That was 62 years ago.

Crayton: And she’d said yes.

Stan: She said yes. We were married in 1962, and I just was delighted. Barb was home, she wanted to be a stay-at-home… She didn’t really want to be a stay at home, but we had our first daughter. Along the time she was at home and expecting our second daughter, I found out that two of the accounts I had been soliciting wanted me to sign up with them, the Cabana Hotel, which was real highly regarded over in Stevens, and the Preston Ticket Agency. Preston Ticket Agency sold a lot of tickets to incoming stars and concert performances. Both wanted me, and I said to Barbara, I got home, I said, “I don’t know how I can handle two clients at the same time in addition to the freelance work.” She said, “Cool it.” She said, “I’ll help you.” So I changed the name of my firm from S.L. Associates to Stan Levenson Associates, and in 1963, Barbara joined me. She ran the business and I worked on the PR and promotion. And then over time she developed an interest in media and really became quite exceptionally talented in media planning and media placements while I continued working with my first two clients, the Cabana. We really got along well.

Crayton: In fact, you together were one of the first, if I read correctly, in the country to come up with this concept of an integrated marketing agency. It used to all be separate, right?

Stan: True.

Crayton: In fact, even today, so many people, you hire a social media agency, you hire media relations, you hire an ad buyer. Of course, there was no social media at that time, but media buying and traditional media relations was very separate. What was that about? How’d you come up with that?

Stan: Well, added value was the key, and the interests were more well-achieved through, say, a public service announcement or publicity on the brand rather than just straight advertising.

Crayton: Yeah.

Stan: So it was an integrated program that we offered.

Crayton: One-stop shop.

Stan: Yeah, exactly. And again, we didn’t charge. A lot of times it was a pro-bono benefit value to our clients.

Crayton: She’d say, “Hey, if you’re going to be an ad buying client, we’ll add on these other elements as an incentive.”

Stan: Exactly. Exactly. Like the business we got from the Preston Ticket Office, they worked in selling tickets, I went to them and said, “As an added service for these concert performances, instead of just selling tickets, why don’t you offer them opportunities for publicity and special event opportunities to get an airplay from a radio station as a added guest to present the concert?” And that worked out well. So Preston Ticket Agency let me outsource a lot of these PR promotional services while we handled a lot of their advertising.

Crayton: If you had any advice for someone from the public relations’ perspective who wanted to get into entertainment today, what advice would you give them?

Stan: I’d say study and anticipate. We had experiences, and I’ll share one interesting one with you, where it’s not just publicizing today with online promotion. The artists don’t regularly come to a city and interview the entertainment editors or columnists. They do it online. It used to be where they would come to town and we’d host them. I think the opportunities are really to anticipate. I had one director, I don’t want to name his name and get in trouble, but he wanted not just a limo, but a motorcycle escort. “Okay, no problem.” He says, “How are you going to get one?” I said, “Well, we’ve got a lot of contacts with funeral homes and others. And he said, “Okay.” So I took him around, not with an escort, but back to Love Field. And before getting out of the car, he said, “Levenson, did you see all those red lights they took us through?” I said, “Yes, sir, that’s what an escort does.” He said, “Well, I was concerned.” And he said, “Let me tell you something else before I leave,” said “I never had any regard for your city because you killed Kennedy. Goodbye.”

Crayton: Wow.

Stan: Can I give you one last example?

Crayton: Please.

Stan: This is a classic. I was fortunate enough to be asked to teach at SMU in the ’80s. I was an adjunct professor in PR management. I thought as a good training session rather than having the students just take notes I encourage them to put it into a format of a conference report, which professionally they’ll need to do if they go into the practice, meet with the client, have a summary. So they did, and I had 28 students. I said, “I’ll get back to you and see how you’re doing and help you develop one of the skills you’ll need if you go into the practice.” I’m emphasizing the need to anticipate. Little did I realize at the time I had to grade 28 papers a week in addition to my other responsibilities and come back with them every week. I learned a lot, and I enjoyed it, and I believe they benefited from the teaching, but it was just a little much.

Crayton: The glimmer and glitz of being adjunct professor kind of wore off pretty quickly, I’m sure.

Stan: I learned a lot. It was great.

Crayton: So of all the clients you’ve worked with, individuals like Pat Boone or Lawrence Welk or The Supremes, corporate brands, the airlines, Chili’s, HEB, what’s been the number one thing that the very best do in order to protect or enhance their reputations?

Stan: Well, I had quite a relationship with a gentleman you know by the name of Quincy Jones, a partnership we formed. I mean, Quincy was a leading potential client, but a genuine partner because we signed a contract. But I had a vision and an idea, and I developed an interest in formalizing it more, so I retained the graduate school at the University of North Texas to do a business plan. I had an opportunity to visit with Quincy. A close friend of mine, Dr. Bob Kramer, was a good friend of his, and he was invited out. He was on a number of Quincy’s boards, his nonprofit boards, and he said, “Come out with me and you can talk.” Because Bob knew I was a jazz advocate. I just was thrilled and did. Bob stayed with Quincy, I was hotel down the street. He invited me over for the afternoon and we talked and really forged good feelings and he said, “Stay for dinner.” I said, “Great, great.” So during dinner I had an interest in sharing with him what I had been thinking about, and I did. And he said, “Interesting.” It was a video-on-demand program. I called it Jazz Video Networks.

Crayton: Okay. What year was this? You remember?

Stan: About 13 years ago.

Crayton: Okay.

Stan: Told him that I’d like to invite him to work together, and might he be interested? Again, the concept was to select and research jazz performances online and feature them in a pay-per-view. Quincy said, “Yeah, sounds real good. Sounds interesting.” I said, “Well, would you like to connect and work together?” Said, “Well, you’ll have to see my business partner or my business advisor.” I said, “Great.” He said, “But I’ll call him and tell him I encourage you to visit with him.” I said, “Beautiful.” So I stayed over and met with them and said, “Yeah.” And I had this business plan. I didn’t want to just go in with an idea I’m really prepared for with or without it. So the business advisor said, “Yeah, I see some possibilities.” I said, “Well, how can we go forward?” He said, “Well, you’ll have to call Quincy’s attorney.” So I said, “Okay.” So shared that with Quincy and told him how it went and said, “I’ll call the attorney too.” So attorney said, “You’ll have to stay for another couple days.” So I did at a hotel. They thought it really had some merit. So the attorney went back to Quincy, said, “I think you’ve got some opportunities.” Quincy said, “Okay, let’s write it up.” So I had to retain an attorney here, a specialist, and present it, and then revisions and all. I think three or four months later, we finalized it. Not long after along comes YouTube, no pay-per-view, just…

Crayton: There it is.

Stan: We asked ourselves, not to mention his advisor, “How are you going to market a cost per view when you can get it for free?” So we halted the development plans and ceased. But I wanted to keep our corporation, we formed an LLC. Wanted to keep that alive, and I have. I renew it with the State of Delaware every year.

Crayton: Every year.

Stan: That was one of my valued relationships.

Crayton: I mean, what’s the lesson out of that? Is it persistence? Is it…

Stan: Well, tenacity, but again, it’s conviction. If you believe in something, I think you need to not go all out, but better understand the needs and interests of your audiences. It’s a giving proposition. All of our strategic communications work and reputation has to be founded in giving and sharing, not just pitching. And you know, you do that, you’re a master at that yourself.

Crayton: Well, you’re kind to say. My wife may not like you so much because my head won’t get through the door. If there’s one thing you’ve seen over the years that clients do wrong that… I mean, and you’ve intimated that already, selfishness or also self-

Stan: Good question.

Crayton: Self-absorption.

Stan: Sure. Well, if a client were to say to you, “Make me famous.”-

Crayton: Watch out.

Stan: … or “Help me become better respected,” the response has to be, “Well, what are you doing to deserve that, to command the respect and appreciation for you and your business and your philosophies and your giving?” The ball’s in your court. You can’t just want to have a reputation. It needs to be earned. So the ball’s in your court.

Crayton: It’s just apparent talking to you, any interaction I have, you’re just one of the most kind, genuine people that I’ve ever had the pleasure of knowing. But you have a reputation for being very straightforward, a very straight shooter with your client or clients. How has that approach helped in the longevity, the fact that so many of them have stayed with you for so long? How do you balance that kindness with the, “Hey, this is straight talk.”?

Stan: Well, it’s preparation and it’s researching not only your client, but his key audiences. It has to begin at home with his employees, with the people that he interacts with.

Crayton: Outside the obvious of the web and then social media, how have you seen the business change over the last 50 years? Or has it rudimentary-

Stan: More impersonal online. I believe it is. You may have seen this lately, they’re online a lot, a company called Real News. It’s a reputation management online. Have you seen that?

Crayton: Oh, sure, yeah.

Stan: It’s like taking a product and marketing it. I think you’ve got to get underneath that and talk about worthiness first for building a reputation to earn it through your services and performance with a focus on the client, not so much the originator.

Crayton: I think creativity counts also, creating memorable moments.

Stan: Very much.

Crayton: You were part, if I understand correctly, of the Baby Back Ribs song-

Stan: Yeah, that’s right.

Crayton: … jingle and promotion for Chili’s. Tell us-

Stan: For our agency.

Crayton: … what was your involvement?

Stan: Well, it was more of an ad program, but we publicized it and had great results. Norman Breaker is a great client, and his daughter, Cindy became a-

Crayton: Business partner.

Stan: … partner, and she’s doing great too. She founded Wipe Out Kids Cancer 40 years ago and has contributed and originated millions of dollars.

Crayton: Just leave it to you to talk about somebody else with your own accolade. So this was a situation where media becomes media, right, so the commercial itself, if I remember correctly, became such a sensation that there was news coverage about the commercial. And that was your role?

Stan: Yeah. Well, we certainly brought it… I don’t want to take full credit, but because on its own it was worthy, but we brought it to the attention of media and the advertising trades, and the word of mouth too helped.

Crayton: What was the secret to having a successful relationship both in business and at home with your wife?

Stan: A lot of pillow talk. We rarely interacted at the office, really. She ran a-

Crayton: You said rarely interacted.

Stan: Yeah, well, when we were working to publicize and promote what she was doing, we would, but Barbara had a big team on the ad side. Another great opportunity was when we merged with Temerlin McClain, with Liener Temerlin. We were with him seven years, and that was a great experience. And then wanted to split back into our own company, but valued that association with Liener and B&J, so Barbara and I formed a new company and invited Liener to be our chairman and gave a minority share to Bozell and Jacobs, which enabled us to take back the entertainment clients that we worked with while at B&J.

Crayton: Back?

Stan: Yeah, because they were our partner, and we also had access to all their creative talent and strategic talent throughout the country. And that was just really very enjoyable, memorable, and strategic partnership.

Crayton: It seems like you’ve talked a lot about partnerships, not only with your wife, but with others. Who you hang your hat with is important. Hitching your wagon to somebody that perhaps has a bigger reputation or a different reputation than you do can take you a long way.

Stan: Well, you have to be a value to them. And that’s the key with reputation management, to see how a client can be not only trusted and worthy, but valued what they can offer.

Crayton: You had a funny and strange interaction with Sammy Davis Jr. and your wife.

Stan: Did you remember that?

Crayton: I would love for you to tell us about it.

Stan: Well, Barbara and I were engaged and her folks wanted to meet my family, my family wanted to meet her and her family. So her folks went over with us to my home in Miami Beach. The folks got along fine and Barbara’s parents, the bride’s parents, said, “Instead of going back to Fort Worth,” where she was from and where they lived and having a wedding, “why don’t we let the kids get married here? Miami Beach has lots of beautiful hotels on the ocean.” And so we did.

Crayton: This was three weeks after you met in 19-

Stan: A little longer. Three weeks after we met we got engaged.

Crayton: Got engaged, okay.

Stan: And then a couple, three weeks later-

Crayton: Wow.

Stan: … went to Florida.

Crayton: Wow. Okay, so we’re not even a couple months later. I mean, we’re-

Stan: Maybe it was two weeks. But the opportunity to get married was great, and we welcomed that. Couple of my relatives were there, one of Barbara’s relatives were, but it was a nice, close wedding at the Hotel Eden Rock. And the next day we got on a flight to Nassau, just across the ocean. Went to Nassau for a honeymoon and got in the cab at the airport, went to the hotel. When we arrived at the hotel, I asked Barbara to wait in the waiting area and let me go to the desk and I’ll register. Good.
So I registered us, walked back, and I see this guy, the back. He was talking to Barbara, and I just walked back and saw his back talking to Barbara. I was thinking, “What’s going on?”

Crayton: “Who’s this?”

Stan: So I went up to him and I said, “Hey, this is my wife.” He went over to her when I was signing up at the desk to see if she’d be interested in having a drink with him. So he turned around and he had a patch on his eye, and lo and behold, it was Sammy Davis Jr. He was playing at a nightclub down the street from the hotel.

Crayton: Did he buy you a drink too, or did y’all just say, “Farewell. Thanks.”

Stan: Adios.

Crayton: So what we do with each episode of Reputation Matters is a lightning round. We’ve got some super fast questions that are specific for you and your background, and then some that we ask all of our guests.

Stan: Okay.

Crayton: First of all, we know you’ve been in the music business, you may have already said it, your favorite music genre?

Stan: I like bebop.

Crayton: Okay.

Stan: Charlie Parker. Dizzy Gillespie.

Crayton: Well, that’s the next question-

Stan: Miles Davis.

Crayton: … favorite musician of all time?

Stan: Bird, Charlie Parker.

Crayton: How much-

Stan: Miles Davis as well.

Crayton: Difference between your favorite performer?

Stan: Ella Fitzgerald and Sarah Vaughan are different vocalists, but they really groove. They’re beautiful vocalists and rhythmic, meaningful in what they sing, and entertaining.

Crayton: I was going to ask you what your favorite record is that you own, but I know that you have donated your library of music, as I understand it, thousands of albums. What was the hardest one to give away that you were like, “Oh, I don’t think so.”?

Stan: That I kept?

Crayton: Well, maybe one that you kept and one that you gave away that was hard to part with.

Stan: Well, there are a lot of them, but the Quincy Jones were special. I like the Dizzy Gillespie with Charlie Parker, Bud Powell, Miles Davis. Those I retained. You’re right, late last year on the occasion, my 90th birthday, I gifted the University of Texas at Dallas the arts and humanities section close to 3,000 items. They included albums, CDs, DVDs, almost 500 books of histories and profiles of jazz artists.

Crayton: Wow.

Stan: Great collection. And about 13 years before that, I gifted another collection to Tulane University. But after they left, I missed them so much I started collecting again.

Crayton: So let me get this straight, you gave them away, and then you bought them again. That’s great.

Stan: But not just the music, the histories. And really, I tried to better understand some of my background experiences, and I was very fortunate to be on the Dallas Urban League and was chairman for two years. I also helped open the African American Museum at Fair Park early on. I attribute that interest in diversity to my love of jazz and African American music and the artists and researching their backgrounds and their histories. And it just embellished me. I really benefited so much in feeling it and experiencing in it, just not reading about it, but acting in it.

Crayton: Yeah. Wonderful. Okay, a few questions we ask all of our guests. What was your favorite subject in school?

Stan: Journalism.

Crayton: What did you major in in college?

Stan: Journalism.

Crayton: Favorite holiday?

Stan: I like, of course, Christmas and Hanukkah and my birthdays right around that time.

Crayton: I like that you consider your birthday a holiday. I think that’s important. What’s your favorite hobby?

Stan: Collecting jazz.

Crayton: Favorite guilty pleasure?

Stan: Guilty? Fried chicken.

Crayton: Favorite day of the week?

Stan: Sundays.

Crayton: Your hidden talent or superpower?

Stan: My superpower?

Crayton: Yeah.

Stan: My wife.

Crayton: Not so hidden. She’s fantastic. And if you could pick one person alive or dead that you could meet for dinner, who would it be?

Stan: My wife. 62 years married.

Crayton: Stan Levenson, you’re a true gentleman. You’re a great storyteller.

Stan: Thank you.

Crayton: And you are an icon, a living legend in reputation management.

Stan: Quite mutual for you.

Crayton: Nothing, my friend, compared to you. I just so appreciate you joining us on Reputation Matters. Your history, your stories are rich and wonderful. You’ve made a difference in so many lives and you’ve been a great teacher to me and to so many others.

Stan: Thank you. Still learning.

Crayton: Yeah.

Stan: Still experiencing.

Crayton: Isn’t that the trick?

Stan: Congratulations to you.