Eric Cote had no idea when he and partner Ken D’Ambrosio set out to start a communications firm eight years ago that they’d develop an expertise in the disaster-preparedness market.
Yet since creating its first public awareness campaign for its first client – Guardian Bastille, a Smithfield-based distributor and installer of security window film – Cote & D’Ambrosio Inc. has grown its work in that niche so much that it is now involved in a major project with a national organization on pandemic flu preparedness, Cote said.
“What we have found is that specialization in a particular niche area is an effective strategy because … very few other firms can match our expertise,” he said. “It makes it easier for prospective clients to hire us. We understand the issues sometimes more deeply than they do.”
The firm’s involvement in disaster preparedness started with the creation of the Protecting People First Foundation with Guardian Bastille and other companies in the window-glazing and insurance industries aiming to spur a national dialogue about flying-glass hazards.
The foundation’s first spokesperson was Aren Almon-Kok, mother of Baylee Almon – one of the children who died in the Oklahoma City bombing in 1995.
Her story prompted federal officials to install blast-resistant windows at the Pentagon, which reportedly saved lives on Sept. 11.
The foundation went on to sponsor a major engineering-based study of how windows in Punta Gorda, Fla., performed during Hurricane Charley in 2004.
“That really continued the expansion of our knowledge of all the technology out there to protect against natural disasters, because we ended up doing inspections of homes and businesses,” Cote said. “We learned about every protection out there.”
The study, called “Finding the Breaking Point,” also led to additional work for Cote & D’Ambrosio in Florida and the opening of a satellite office in Tampa in 2005. (The firm is headquartered in Wickford.)
After reading the study, the Federal Alliance for Safe Homes – or FLASH Inc. – hired Cote & D’Ambrosio to lead a research project on Floridians’ attitudes toward terrorist attacks.
Based on the results, Cote & D’Ambrosio developed a public awareness campaign on terrorism for the nonprofit, which is dedicated to promoting life safety and property protection in the event of natural and man-made disasters.
One of the interesting things the firm learned, Cote said, was that Floridians’ awareness of hurricane safety far outweighed their awareness of terrorism safety. Yet preparing for both a hurricane and a terrorist attack are almost identical – people need food reserves and water and emergency contact numbers.
As a result, the firm created the campaign message, “If you’re prepared for a hurricane, you’re more than halfway prepared for a terrorist attack.”
Cote said one of the greatest lessons the firm has learned about communicating with the public through disaster-related messaging is that “you have to focus your message on personal safety and family safety.” Otherwise, Cote said, unless an area has recently experienced a man-made disaster, it’s hard to get the public to respond.
Along with its Florida work, Cote & D’Ambrosio has been involved in private-sector initiatives on hurricane awareness in Rhode Island, he said, focusing on how people can protect their homes. The firm also worked in Mississippi and Louisiana after Hurricane Katrina in 2005, setting up a third office in Baton Rouge, La., that year.
The firm’s safety and security niche still only comprises about 25 percent of its total business but it has been one of the most gratifying, Cote said, because “we help save lives in the course of doing our work.”
