Ed Lamoureaux

Ed Lamoureaux is Senior Vice President of Marketing & Sales for the broadcast PR company WestGlen Communications, a major producer of video news releases.

Lamoureaux started with WestGlen in mid-2004. "He brings a comprehensive knowledge of traditional and digital media, having held key executive management roles at The Newsmarket, VMS, Bacon’s Information, Medialink, and USWeb/CKS," WestGlen's newsletter states. 

In January 2005, PR Week reported on the trend towards "guaranteed placement" of video news releases by paying broadcast companies seeking payment to air them. Lamoureaux told PR Week that "the idea of securing a placement and using a VNR is more of a grassroots outreach and has become very popular ... It goes hand in hand with the coming together of advertising and PR," he said. 

In response to a major New York Times article on video news releases (VNRs), the PR trade publication O'Dwyers PR Daily convened a teleconference of leading VNR company representatives to discuss "what the industry can do about the torrent of negative publicity". 

In the discussion on the level of disclosure of the source of VNRs Lamoureaux stated that while producers should identify the source to broadcasters it was up to the media "gatekeepers" to ensure that the final news report was balanced. "And we, as an industry, potentially could help to both educate the public and work with the news media to, you know, make a better situation all around, so that we don't see channels for this kind of paid advocacy drying up, as we have seen in the past with different flaps in the fact that some stations have been told that--the junior level producers have been told by the higher-ups that, you know, we're not going to take this outside content," he said.