How I Built Philadelphia's Largest, Most Influential Public Relations Firm
By Greg Matusky, CEO of Gregory FCA
Two weeks ago, I ran into an old friend and competitor who left the public relations business years ago to become a full-time professor.
During his PR days, he was a formidable challenger—charismatic, creative, clever, and communicative—the four Cs that separate the good from the best in our game. He sought me out to congratulate me on our recent acquisition of BackBay Communications, a high-end financial public relations firm based in Boston. And then he asked me, "How did you do it?" How did you become the top PR firm in Philly and one of the largest in the country all from Ardmore, PA? That got me thinking. I have been running so hard for so many years that I never sat down and figured it out. I was too busy changing and evolving, too fixated on clients and colleagues to digest the firm.
What was the secret sauce?
Let's be honest: Philadelphia isn't exactly a hotbed of public relations talent. Unlike the fast currents of New York's PR scene or the political intrigue of Washington, D.C. Philly stands in the shadows. And while Philadelphia is known for many things, public relations isn't one of them. In fact, according to Clutch, the nation’s sixth-largest city counts only 7,000 public relations professionals out of 270,000 nationwide.
Fortunately, I didn’t realize this when I started my firm in 1990. I just wanted to be close to family and friends. In hindsight, this naivete set me on a much different course than New York or Silicon Valley firms. The local limitations forced me to develop homegrown talent through a commitment to training. We implemented daily and weekly formalized training sessions, holding two sessions a week. We record and transcribe these sessions, archiving them in a searchable database thanks to AI. Topics ranged from managing difficult client calls to securing news coverage by the New York Times, and we enjoy about 80% firmwide attendance to these trainings. This rigorous approach to training has been instrumental in our success, ensuring our team is well-equipped to handle various challenges and opportunities.
Understanding Local PR Landscape and How Gregory FCA Became Philadelphia’s Top Public Relations Firm
Then, every summer, we welcome five to fifteen new college graduates to an immersive junior associate program. This program is structured as a case competition, where teams of new hires work and study together and compete against each other. The training fosters teamwork and practical learning, giving our junior associates a comprehensive introduction to the industry and preparing them for long-term success within the firm. “The junior associate program gave me the core competencies vital to speeding the time needed to contribute to the firm,” begins Madison Buiting, a Gregory FCA account executive. “At first, it was overwhelming; all that needed to be learned was not taught in college. But things started to click. The business started to make sense, all because of the time and training commitment Gregory FCA put into me as a junior associate.”
The proof of how such a commitment develops talent is in the pudding. According to COO Brittany Liberatore, the average Vice President at Gregory FCA enjoys 10 year tenure. And one of the company’s owners and board members, Joe Anthony, started with Gregory FCA in its junior associate program in 2002.
“We were the first agency in the country to develop our own internal generative AI platform, even before OpenAI introduced ChatGPT in November of 2022”
To Become the Top PR Firm in Philly, Think Out of the Box
My, how the world has changed over 40 years. When I entered the PR industry, it was an old boys' club where business deals were often sealed in swanky Center City private clubs and restaurants over cocktails and steaks.
It was a world off-limits to me. I started as a business writer and an associate editor at Success magazine in New York. My networks ran counter to the local elite. Instead, I spent my time sourcing stories from around the country. So, when I switched careers from writer to publicist, I looked well outside Philadelphia. My first client came from Northern Virginia. Others soon followed from Tennessee, Boston, Chicago, and the West Coast. As such, I always envisioned a public relations firm with tentacles reaching national if not international, clients.
I marketed and presented myself and the firm accordingly. Our website did not mention Philly and promoted a diverse client list from all parts of the country. But we went much further. Scale allowed us to specialize and shed the inefficiencies of being generalists—initially, the firm specialized in franchising.
Then, as the tech bubble of the 1990s inflated, technology became our raison d'être. In the 2000s, it was all about real estate, and when that market collapsed, we focused on a range of select verticals, including financial services, real estate, cybersecurity, enterprise technology, investor relations, education, AI, and non-profits.
Ironically, we did become more generalized in one area—creative services. As public relations has become more sophisticated, our clients sought to augment storytelling with digital marketing, video production, social media, investor relations, sustainability and energy, traditional creative, as well as content marketing and distribution. We obliged and added these more generalized services to support our specialized team. By keeping it in-house, we helped our margins. Still, more importantly, we maintained the clarity and consistency of our clients' narratives as they moved within the firm without losing the storyline to outside parties.
Money is What Made Gregory FCA Philadelphia's Top, Most Influential Public Relations Firm
From the start, I never wanted Gregory FCA to be just a practice—I aimed to build a business with lasting value.
My goal was to create a tangible asset that wouldn’t fade into the woodwork when I retired or left. Private equity made sense, not as an exit per se, but as a capital source to accomplish things I could never have done on my own. Money is always key. So, when Copley Equity Partners called us in the summer of 2019, we listened closely and eventually welcomed them as a capital partner.
That deal set the stage for significant investments. With Copley's support, we acquired three firms over the next four years. This infusion of capital allowed us to think and act differently, with a major focus on tech-enablement. We envisioned a firm that embraced technology to deliver higher-quality work and better results for our clients.
Our AI strategies are a prime example. We were the first agency in the country to develop our own internal generative AI platform, even before OpenAI introduced ChatGPT in November of 2022. After that, we outfitted the entire firm with key AI platforms and developed an intensive training program on the safe and effective use of AI in PR. This investment has been a boon to productivity, allowing us to exceed previous per-employee revenue figures and leapfrog in national rankings.
According to O'Dwyer's Bulldog Reporter, a respected trade journal, we are now the 36th largest PR firm in the country and the sixth largest financial services PR firm. Our journey from a local start-up to a national powerhouse underscores the importance of strategic investment and a forward-thinking approach. But in the end, as with most service businesses, it’s about the people, and at Gregory FCA it’s the people who account for how we became the top public relations firm in Philadelphia.