About the Team Members at Heather Freeman Media & Public Relations

 

In addition to Heather Freeman’s many years of experience in the public relations arena of Washington, D.C. and beyond, our firm has some talented people who help create and execute the public relations strategies that bring clients to the forefront in the media.

 

Scott Homstead is the Vice President of the company and the husband of Heather Freeman. He is instrumental in building and maintaining our expansive data base of local and national media outlets, as well as notifying us of media leads concerning upcoming articles. Scott also electronically distributes press releases to our media contacts as well as utilizing the social networks to spread the word. He maintains the company website which is designed to be a useful tool for our press audience. Scott is based in the home office in Florida and also handles all the billing and contracts for us..

 

 

 

 

Lindley Thornburg is our public relations consultant who is actually a native Washingtonian, growing up in Arlington, and graduating from Virginia Tech.  She has been with our firm over four years, and assists on the daily public relations efforts on multiple, successful projects including the Park Hyatt Washington’s Blue Duck Tavern; Zola; Redwood and Sonoma, California Wine Institute, and the landmark 1789 Restaurant. Lindley was instrumental in the successful launch campaign for Salvatore Ferragamo in Tysons Corner in 2005. She also helped to open Washington’s most popular new restaurant in 2006, the Blue Duck Tavern, which has garnered rave reviews in Bon Appetit, Food & Wine, National Geographic Traveler, Washingtonian, The Washington Post, Washington Times, DC Magazine, Capitol File, Travel & Leisure to name a few.  Lindley came to work for Heather Freeman Media & PR by way of Clyde’s Restaurant Group, who highly recommended her to us as she worked for them for several years learning the restaurant business via the front-of-the-house, during college.

 

 

     

Megan Bailey joined our public relations team as a consultant in the summer of 2006. A graduate of the University of Maryland, with a degree in communications and public relations, she was recommended to us by a magazine publisher who thought she was a terrific fit for our team.  Megan assists with THINKfoodGROUP’s vibrant accounts spearheaded by celebrity chef José Andrés including Jaleo, Café Atlantico, Zaytinya, Oyamel and minibar by josé andrés.  She helped open the highly publicized Oyamel in Washington, D.C. and also works on Jamie Leeds’ Hank’s Oyster Bar in both Washington and in Old Town Alexandria, Virginia and CommonWealth.  Other projects that she is involved with on a daily basis include Legal Sea Foods in the nation’s capital, Ashok Bajaj’s award-winning restaurants and Robert Wiedmaier’s new BRABO, by Robert Wiedmaier. She is helping orchestrate the October 2009 launch of Kellari as well as José Andrés Catering with Ridgewells.  Megan has great broadcast media contacts, booking so many of our chefs on both Channel 5 and Channel 9 that we have lost count, and she also great relationships with radio stations such as Mix 107.3, DC 101 and WTOP.

 

 

Polly Wiedmaier has worked with us for ten years. Polly is no stranger to the restaurant world as her husband is Chef/Owner Robert Wiedmaier and the mother of two young boys, both their restaurant namesakes, Marcel and Beck. We met through the launch of Wiedmaier’s Marcel’s restaurant.  Polly assembles our press kits, plus designs and prints invitations for our clients. She also worked diligently with Heather on the launch of Robert Wiedmaier’s second restaurant, Brasserie Beck in April 2007, which has also received phenomenal coverage in the press, with features in Washingtonian, The Washington Post, The Washington Post Express, The Onion, Washington Times, DC Magazine, Where, DC Examiner, Elle Décor, City Paper, Southern Living and Bon Appetit.  In 2009 we opened BRABO by Robert Wiedmaier, BRABO Tasting Room and the Butcher’s Block, A Market by RW in Alexandria, Virginia.  Polly has a B.S. in Business from the University of Maryland and has lived in the Washington area all her life.