Patriotic Duty: Team Hires PR Firm To Help With Efforts In China

The Patriots have hired Shanghai-based PR firm @PR to “help coordinate a bootcamp this week where 20 to 30 Chinese media representatives" will learn how to hold, throw and kick a football, according to Jesse Noyes of the BOSTON HERALD.  Patriots Dir of Chinese Business Development Nicholas Krippendorf said that the team will also begin selling “official team merchandise at Reebok stores in Beijing.”  Noyes notes Patriots TE Ben Watson is beginning a media tour of China today, while several of the team's cheerleaders will follow him next week.  The club is also working on new ventures including a Chinese version of a fantasy football game on the team’s Web site.  The ventures are all part of the Patriots’ “international marketing game plan, which stresses going long in China” (BOSTON HERALD, 6/25).