The Situation:

Team Soapbox was hired by the Northwest Maritime Center to manage media relations for the opening of a new school in the Highline School District, the Maritime High School. A collaborative project of Highline Public Schools, Northwest Maritime Center, Port of Seattle, and the Duwamish River Cleanup Coalition, the school provides students with hands-on learning opportunities in the maritime field.

The Approach:

Within two weeks of engagement with the client, our team successfully pitched and placed multiple media stories on the new school. Media coverage included broadcast television on Univison, KIRO 7 and Q13, coverage in the Puget Sound Business Journal, South Seattle Emerald, Burien B-Town Blog, and MyNorthwest, a Sunday front-page feature article in The Seattle Times, and radio story on KUOW in Seattle and a national radio story on National Public Radio.

Since the launch of the school in the fall of 2021, our media relations outreach has continued and additional media placements on broadcast coverage on KING 5, and print articles in NW Yachting Magazine, Puget Sound Business Journal, The Stranger, and Converge Media.

The strong response from the media provided us with the opportunity to lead media training for staff at Northwest Maritime Center and Maritime High School. The training provided staff with knowledge of how to engage with a reporter, and mock-interview scenarios.