Ex-rivals make peace and PR with Grow
Wearing matching knee-high leather boots and Nanette Lepore dresses, Cassie Hughes and Gabrey Means look like old friends - which they are definitely not.
In the cutthroat world of corporate publicity campaigns, Hughes, the former head of publicity at Levi's, and Means, the former experiential marketing director at Gap, were each other's primary competition for nearly a decade.
When Means invited the singer Duncan Sheik to a product launch party, Hughes rented Coney Island for hers.
Today, they are practically attached at the hip, and have joined forces in Grow Marketing, one of San Francisco's hottest PR firms, with clients like Glenlivet, EA Sports, WonderBra and Sephora.
Hughes is a dressage rider from Orinda whose father taught her to always dress up to go downtown and who starts her day with a vegan shake.
Grow Marketing, whose pastel-colored offices are in a Victorian in the Marina, specializes in quirky, highly focused events - like a startup funding sweepstakes to promote Intuit's business software or Absolut-sponsored parties in the private homes of carefully chosen influencers.
Having our own company now, so much of what we have to do is take care of ourselves - stay healthy, fit, stay strong and energetic.
Jane's green juice makes me feel more awake than coffee.
[...] my husband and I can sit back on the Adirondack chairs at the Park Chalet having Bloody Marys - that is a Sunday at its absolute best.
The best thing about Off the Grid is you can expose your kid to lots of different cultures, and it's all delicious and low risk.