5WPR

Ever wondered what the offices of 5WPR look like? Well there are cubicles, a kitchen, people on the phone, two copies of Machiavelli’s The Prince, and everyone gets a Shake Weight.

Business Insider has published a story and slideshow about Ronn Torrossian and his firm and it’s mostly positive.

We asked the author, Jim Edwards, a senior editor at the site, about the story, specifically why he excluded the recent news that the government was investigating Torossian over allegations that he’s involved in a scheme that cost a popular New York City rabbi millions. He told us he debated the issue.

Read more

Launch a social media campaign that will build your brand and deliver results in our online Social Media Marketing Boot Camp starting June 7. Speakers include Abigail Cusick (Bravo Digital), Gregory Galant (Sawhorse Media), Alex Leo (Thomson Reuters Digital), Jim Tobin (Ignite Social Media), and many more. Read the reviews.

5WPR founder Ronn Torossian has been named in an investigation over an alleged plot that one rabbi’s followers say resulted in the loss of millions of dollars of the congregation’s money.

According to The New York Times, followers of Rabbi Yoshiyahu Yosef Pinto have accused a former aide, Ofer Biton, of taking money intended for charity. Moreover, they say that Biton hatched a plan with Torossian to push negative news in the media. The story says:

The rabbi’s followers have also charged that Mr. Biton and Ronn Torossian, a public relations agent based in Manhattan, engaged in a scheme in which they leaked purportedly damaging information about the rabbi to reporters. Then, the followers said, Mr. Biton pushed to have Mr. Torossian put on retainer to help put an end to the bad publicity.

No one has been charged or found guilty of anything. However, the U.S. attorney’s office and the FBI have stepped in to investigate.

In the story, Biton denies “any involvement whatsoever in any plot.” Torossian also said he had no comment in the story. He sent us an email with a short statement: “I have no knowledge of any of the absurd allegations alluded to,” he wrote.

Shortly after, he added to his comments, also via email.

Read more

VentureBeat executive editor Owen Thomas received a pitch from 5WPR and sent it to his reporters to review. Sounds good so far.

Then, according to Gawker, the firm sent a bunch of e-mails to follow-up. And when there was no response to these “frantic e-mails,” Thomas got a call on his mobile while he was hosting a conference. That’s when the pitch took a bad turn.

Read more

5WPR CEO Ronn Torossian has given his blog a re-design. RonnTorossian.com is now up and running.

(Guerrilla domain squatting begets very douchey counter-squatting; image found on RonnTorossianPR.com at press time)

Leaks, lawsuits and cyber-squatting continues in the saga of the Fastest Growing PR Agency ever, 5WPR.

CEO Ronn [sic] Torossian as he’s known on Gawker, is threatening another enemy with a lawsuit. This time it’s his own recently departed head of HR over help she may have given to a colleague’s job search.

The scoop belongs to former PRWeek reporter Hamilton Nolan, of course.

Hamilton can forget launching a website using his own name as the URL. Guess who bought the domain? Yes, 5WPR!

We’re looking in to the merry prankster behind RonnTorossianPR.com which at press time conveyed quite a clean and refreshing message.

(Kim Kardashian & Reggie Bush burn rubber in the Lifestyles Make-Out booth)

PR bad boy Ronn Torossian and his crew are wrapping up their second annual Escape Mansion promotion at Sundance this weekend with a final party tonight. In addition to after-hours and parties, 5WPR hosted a “gifting” suite on Main Street, and a poker tournament to benefit the Creative Coalition.

According to emails from Torossian, members of U2 and Maroon5 were gifted during the day, and A-listers such as the Hiltons and Olsens partied till dawn at the Butter restaurant-sponsored parties.

To Sundance founder Robert Redford’s dismay, being seen at the Festival has become an important publicity bonanza. In turn, shops like 5WPR throw lavish sponsored parties, and lure in the celebs with sweet swag given by product clients.

Ronn and pals seemed to have a good mix of people, places and things to synergize this year’s Mansion promo with clients like Butter, Rocawear, and Nick Cannon, with Lifestyles Condoms providing a nice stunty backdrop for photo opps.

Cannon’s starring role in Iraq war movie “American Son” makes him a legit focus of the dealmaking the Festival was originally designed for.

I will do my best to avoid the natural headline “Liquor in the front, poker in the…” when I receive the results of the tournament. A full rundown of the firm’s weekend after the jump, courtesy of 5WPR’s Katie Murphy:

Read more

(Ronn Torossian, CEO of 5WPR on Tyra Banks)

Tune in to Tyra Banks today to see everyone’s favorite bad boy of PR, Ronn Torossian dispensing advice on how to repair your image in the age of YouTube.

We were able to catch this quote from the Tyra site preview: “if you’re drinking and acting nutty like a celebrity, don’t let cameras near you.”

Sage advice. Sources tell us “24″ star Kiefer Sutherland dove headlong in to a veritable forest of Christmas trees this year once he got those cameras out of his face.

(image courtesy of Clipart)

If there is one non-web2.0 PR agency more blogged than 5WPR, we’d like to know about it. Adjectives in the mainstream media beget expletives in the blogoshere with this firm, and accolades ignite the linklove too.

5WPR is listed on the O’Dwyer’s 100 as the fastest growing independent firm in for he U.S. for three years running (#22), and is #153 on the Inc. 500, while the firm’s CEO Ronn Torossian earned spots on the PRWeek 40 Under 40, and Gotham‘s 100 Most Eligible Bachelors for 2007.

Add another one to the list for 2007, and cue the flaming emails, as 5WPR is the winner of Morris+King‘s “Dishonorable Mention” Profnet Query Award for 2007. M+K Account Supervisor and co-compiler of the Best Profnet Queries, Justin Kazmark was quoted in the release, “yikes” regarding 5WPR’s “sketchy” net-cast for a tragedy victim to bolster a morning show spot.

The full portion of the release with winning query and Morris+King boilerplate (because I haven’t included it yet and because they might as well get some SEO in exchange for the Prof-smack) is after the jump:

Read more