Ad/PR prof brings energy, enthusiasm

By Asher Fogle ‘07

A plastic Shaquille O’Neal, wearing an old-school purple LSU uniform, slam dunks on the handle of a black Office Depot hutch cabinet above her desk, a reminder of both her passion for college athletics and her years as a graduate student at Louisiana State University.

Today, however, assistant professor Stacy Landreth-Grau teaches in the Schieffer School, channeling her enthusiasm toward advertising/Public Relations students.

Landreth-Grau joined the Schieffer School faculty in August 2006. She has taught ad/PR research, media planning, and a graduate course called Advertising and the Consumer.

 “There’s so much new, non-traditional media out there, like social networking, blogs, podcasts and things like that,” Landreth-Grau said. “It’s opened up a whole new area of research. That’s really where my energy comes from for media planning.”

With her leg tucked beneath her and her hands gesturing continuously, Landreth-Grau seemed ready to spring out of her chair at the next idea or opportunity for action.

“Right now, I am finding myself working like a madwoman, which is probably my fault,” she said, half smiling. “Probably my worst tendency, which I can admit and am working on, is that there are too many things that I want to do. I have a tendency to go off in a lot of different directions, with equal enthusiasm across the board.”

One direction Landreth-Grau has pursued is advertising research, both consumer response and corporate responsibility. Her projects have ranged from health literacy and drug facts labels on medicine bottles to the usage of stereotypes in advertising.

“Almost all of it has to do with the consumer,” Landreth-Grau said. “There are a few things that I look at that are more from the organizational standpoint, like a non-profit or company, but for the most part it’s really about how consumers perceive things.”

Landreth-Grau said that academic research is often criticized for being very esoteric and inapplicable to society as a whole. This assessment, though, only motivates her to create ways to translate academic research into “a language people can understand.”

“You look at a lot of this stuff, and I know we have to write it for other academics,” she said. “While that’s fine in one sense, the people who really need it don’t get it. They don’t have access to it.”

This emphasis on social responsibility and desire to find practical applications for her research has fueled her interest in non-profit organizations. Landreth-Grau hopes to occasionally work with ad agencies and non-profit organizations in a consulting capacity as an account planner, because, she said, non-profits often lack the resources to hire a major firm but could benefit from many advertising techniques.

Non-profit organizations rely on the strength of their name and reputation, Landreth-Grau said, which affects the types of companies that they can partner with for fundraising or business.

“If you start sullying up that name and that brand, you’ve just got to be real careful,” she said “And I don’t think that’s something that has really been brought forth in the research yet.”

Despite the time spent in brainstorming and research, Landreth-Grau still manages to find time to be a teacher and mentor for her students. She said she enjoys the small classes at TCU which enable her to develop close relationships with individuals.

She said she used to believe the connection resulted from her age, but now the 35-year-old professor thinks it stems from something else – an understanding of her students’ stage of life.

When her students trust her and have a close relationship with her, Landreth-Grau said some feel confident enough to bring her their problems outside the classroom.

“To me,” she said, “that’s really where a lot of the intrinsic value comes in as a teacher.”

However, Landreth-Grau doesn’t discount the value of understanding and applying classroom material.
“I like it when they take a class or something I’ve had them read, and they are able to do something with it. It gets them excited, it gets them fired up, and they want to go out and learn more about it. I have some kids in there that are sharp, and they’re fired up. They want to go into it, and they’re passionate and engaged in the process. That makes it worth it.”

Senior international communications and Spanish double-major Margot Zanner was a member of the award-winning Campaigns Team, which Landreth-Grau advised. She said she was inspired by Landreth-Grau’s spark and energy for her work.

“Because she’s so young and very into what she doing and teaching, it makes me want to be around her and learn why she is so into it,” Zanner said. “Her passion rubs off if you spend any time with her.”
An influential mentor in Landreth-Grau’s own life may provide the impetus for her involvement with students.

While she was working for an M.S. in marketing at LSU, Landreth-Grau was convinced by a mentor to pursue a Ph.D. After receiving her Ph.D. from LSU in 2002, she taught on the faculty of Villanova University in Philadelphia.

When Landreth-Grau’s husband took a job with an oil and gas company in Fort Worth, she went to teach in the College of Business at the University of North Texas for a year until giving birth to her 21-month-old daughter, Ellie. 
Ellie’s black and white photo sits on the desk in her office, and a finger-paint picture of her handprints is tacked to the file cabinet door, reminders of life outside of academia.

“She’s a pistol.” She grinned with mother’s pride. “She’s got a lot of energy.”

Just like her mother.