Happy retirement Mike!

Our co-founder, Mike King, says his  retirement goodbyes after 35 years in the PR industry. 

How did that happen? 

I’ve just hit 60 and have decided it is time for me to retire. As I’m sure everyone says, I can’t believe how quickly the time has passed, but after 35 years working in tech PR that’s my lot as far as my professional life is concerned. 

Thirty-five years ago, I moved from journalism into tech PR and in that time have owned and run three different tech PR agencies. The first was the UK office of a French PR firm which I eventually sold for a pound (long story); the second I founded and ran for more than 20 years with offices in London, Paris, and Munich before we sold it ten years ago for considerably more; and, of course, the latest is Eleven Hundred Agency, that I co-founded with Claire Ayles, and is now in its eighth year, in rude health and that I leave in very capable hands.

Talking of capable hands, Claire, the driving force behind Eleven Hundred Agency, is the best PR professional I’ve ever worked with. After 25 years of working together I can truly say that she’s brilliant at her job and I certainly couldn’t have done it without her.

In addition to Claire, I’ve managed to find and work with many really talented and hardworking people. A genuine thank you to each and every one who has been involved in my career as colleagues and clients. It’s been a great journey (with some crazy moments and plenty of drunken parties).

I still chuckle to myself when I remember being introduced by a client to aging ex-wrestler Mick McManus at a trade show (McManus had long retired from wrestling and was, oddly, doing PR work for a tech firm). McManus was told that I was a star struck fan and I had to play along when he came up to me (an old man with jet black dyed hair) and presented me with his autograph. Or when I persuaded Jonathan Ross, who was compère at an industry awards ceremony, to ask my client for his autograph because he appeared so regularly in the press.

Coming from a background in journalism, I’d only ever been on the receiving end of the PR process and I learnt some valuable lessons early in my PR career. One of the first press events I arranged taught me the importance of managing client expectations and that, frankly, the customer isn’t always right. A mid-sized US tech firm was undertaking a European press tour and I was tasked with organising a 50 person press conference to, as far as I recall, celebrate the company’s 30th birthday (including, at the client's insistence, wheeling out a very large birthday cake on a trolley). My advice that there wasn’t a news story of interest to the UK press was ignored on the basis that press conferences were also being arranged in the US, France and Germany and the client insisted we go ahead. On the day of the conference, we had a huge conference room and only four journalists turned up. It was particularly embarrassing when the huge cake was wheeled out. Of course, I lost the client.

Another client back in the early days asked for my honest feedback on the suitability of their US generated press releases for UK consumption. I told them that (at five or six pages long) they were too long-winded, contained excessive amounts of jargon, were too complicated and assumed far too much prior knowledge. I, of course, offered to re-write them so they were far more succinct and easier to digest. I lost the client and learnt a valuable lesson in diplomacy. 

This is my second attempt at retirement. Back in 2017, just after we sold our previous agency, I stopped working, bought a bungalow at the seaside and got a Porsche (two actually). I only lasted about six weeks before boredom set it. Mind you, I’ll happily blame my wife who, upon finding out that I intended to retire, quickly started a retail business that meant she was literally out of the house working seven days a week.

This time around, we are much more prepared for a life of leisure. We are back living in London (contrary to popular belief it is not always nice to be beside the seaside), are in closer proximity to where our daughters and grandkids live, and (I think) I’m over my mid-life crisis. Oddly though, I still have a slight nagging feeling that one day I’ll work out what I want to do for a living when I eventually grow up. For now, I’m off down the pub to try and figure it out.