Interns@AutoCom

Hey AutoComers, You may be wondering who I am, why I’m at AutoCom, and why I’ll disappear before I get to really know any of you. I’m a senior at Country Day and my school has a program they call Senior Project. The basic idea is to get the seniors officially out of the school so they no longer have to deal with our senioritis. Thus, we spend the month of May and early June engaged in a project of our choice. The seniors can pick any field, in any place they want. People do projects as diverse as writing books, creating artwork, serving as a teacher’s assistant, shadowing doctors, and working for magazines. The only requirements are that we work thirty hours a week and turn in a brief paper at the end so that we can graduate. So why am I at AutoCom? It may seem like a strange place for a girl whose main interest is in history and politics and who dreams of working overseas for a non-profit organization, but it really isn’t. The skills AutoCom uses in public relations apply not only to ...

Hello to the AutoCom Team I loved reading all your postings on interns@autocom. For someone who does not know you yet it seems like you are all one big family. I like that. Why am I writing on this blog? I want to become an intern at AutoCom. I just arrived in Michigan two months ago. My hometown in Germany is Heilbronn next to Stuttgart, but the last six years I studied in Konstanz, which is really in the south of Germany, directly at the border to Switzerland (at the swabian sea). I am 27 and my stay in Michigan will be my second US stay. I studied one year in Oregon, which made me love the US and convinced me to come back. Why Michigan? Because Markus, my husband, works in the automotive business…and well, you know that Metro Detroit is an automotive paradise…so to speak. Some of the things former interns wrote seem already familiar to me. I know about the beautiful downtown area in Royal Oak, where it is a lot of fun to go out at night and where –very surprisingly- you meet a lot ...

May 10: It was a sunny day during a week full of rain. Christina and I met with Jack in Bloomfield Hills. He was so kind to give us a ride so we could enjoy the landscape. On our way to Port Huron, we picked up Jan who became the car DJ. Jack has satellite radio and so we could choose between the 40s, 50s, 60s, 70s, 80s, 90s, Bluegrass, Country, Jazz, Hip Hop, R’n’B, Rock, Blues, etc. I like the 60s and 70s, Jan the 90s, Jack Bluegrass and Christina Rock. As you can imagine DJ Jan had a tough ride… As we were in Port Huron one hour to early, we decided to have a little “wedding appetizer” at Wendy’s. After some fries, sandwiches and milk shakes we drove to the church where we met Larry Weis and Kathi McCarroll, Don Habarek and Nancy Arnold, Joe and Mary Cabadas, Jim Meloche and the other AutoCom girls. The celebration was in the St. Joseph Catholic Church. It’s a beautiful old church and Marty and Ruth had it decorated lovely. Marty’s youngest son Justin opened the service with the so...

In its 7th year, the SAE Media Dinner at Coach Insignia was a huge success thanks to the participation by all of our clients and the significant media attendance. Coach Insignia was the perfect setting for an evening that included fantastic cuisine, an unparalleled view of Detroit and unique networking opportunities for all. The attendee list included senior executives from Behr, Coherix, Eberspaecher, GKN Driveline, Hella, InterRegs, MANN+HUMMEL, Trubiquity and Wallonia as well as 45 of the industry’s top automotive editors and reporters. Other activities included an InterRegs press conference, the annual MANN+HUMMEL media briefing along with Hella’s press luncheon. All three events were successful and generated positive exposure for the companies involoved. Hella Luncheon Mann+Hummel luncheon A big thank you goes out to all who participated and we look forward to next years SAE World Congress!

We’re going to the dogs … and cats, birds, rabbits -- we’re looking for photos and digital images of your cutest household pets! For our first annual PET IDOL Contest, send us a photo or a high-resolution jpeg image (300 d.p.i.) so that we can post your pet’s photo online. Please submit photos to Silke Schwarte at sschwarte@usautocom.com . This contest will be in conjunction with our Traverse City week festivities and events. For more information, contact Maggie Beauregard at 248.647.8621 or by e-mail at mbeauregard@usautocom.com .

Christina’s Highlight in February? The NADA conference in San Francisco!! Wow! How fast the time goes by. So many things are going on. I thought I should tell you about my latest journey. At the beginning of February I got the chance to go to San Francisco to NADA (National Automobile Dealers Association) Convention and Expo 2008 with Larry and Marty. It’s one of the biggest shows in North America. We had to represent two new clients – vAuto and Compared Insurance. It was awesome! Not only to get the chance to go to San Francisco, which is such a lovely, busy and sunny city, but also to experience the convention at first hand. I was working for vAuto and one of my tasks was to take care for the Press Kits. I had to assemble them, put them into the press room at the convention center, to take part at an interview between the client and a publication and at vAuto’s sales meeting with their people before the show on Friday. We had to be present at vAuto’s booth to welcome journalists and ...

News from AutoCom’s current interns: Christina started her internship at AutoCom in July 2007, my first day was October 1, 2007 and now it’s the end of February 2008. I guess former interns can confirm that time is running so fast in Michigan. We celebrated Halloween in our office and went to a Halloween party, ate turkey on Thanksgiving and opened Xmas presents on the 25th of December. New Years Eve is over and so are the resolutions for 2008. We were in love on Valentines Day and now we are waiting for Easter… It’s time for some highlights of the last two months. Silke’s highlight in December? The visit of my family! I rented a van for seven people visiting me. First we spent some time in Michigan. We visited the Henry Ford museum, where we stayed almost the whole day. We were very impressed by all the old cars, carriages and trains. On the same day we viewed Edsel and Eleanor Ford’s house and found out that they had a souvenir from Germany in their library. On December 26, we drove ...