Farewell to Always a Brunette and Welcome to Nina’s Network

In order to welcome my readers to Nina’s Network, I need to first take you on a journey and explain how we ended up here. Join me in saying farewell to Always a Brunette, my first blog that evolved with me and my career. The shift of branding of this blog is symbolic and it shows that when I started out, I didn’t have a long-term plan. It is about to be transformed into something a little different, a bit more sophisticated yet still just as whimsical and honest as the original blog.

The launch and now end of Always a Brunette is like a coming-of-age tale. I didn’t know that while I was building it because I was so young and without a strategic plan. I had good intentions but there was not a solid plan, just a lot of action. I grew my personal and professional network during the time of Always a Brunette. Being a blogger, I was an influencer in a way but at the time I didn’t realize what that even meant. Now, my career has blossomed, and I can reflect and be grateful for the opportunities I seized. I’m a faithful person so reflecting and counting my blessings is something I try to do often.

The Beginning of ‘Always a Brunette’

It all started back in the fall of 2011 when I was laid off from my job at Crowne Plaza Downtown as Marketing Coordinator due to a budget cut. My position was eliminated, and I was devastated but since it was early on in my career, I had many options. So, I created a free blog using Blogger.com to get myself noticed and out there. I created ‘Always a Brunette’, a blog about a variety of topics, mostly reviews of restaurants, events and it was also a chronicle of my triathlon training at the time. The name was selected because I wanted to be true to my roots of who I was no matter where I ended up. I wanted a blog to have an online space to share content about topics that interested me. It was during the time when digital journals were popular. I didn’t want to share too much personal info, but it was a way for people to get to know me. It was only a hobby and online portfolio but before long it helped make several opportunities available for me.

I was not unemployed for long. However, the blog really didn’t have anything to do with me finding my next job, it certainly helped me grow my network. As many say, your network is your net worth. I was hired by Girl Scouts of South Eastern PA as a temporary marketing manager. It was a job that was only three months while they were going through leadership transitions. On the last week of that temp. job, I was offered a full-time job at AMResorts as a marketing coordinator. It was the perfect job for me at the time. I wanted to get back into the hospitality industry and I love to travel. It’s a world that I felt comfortable in and really enjoyed the challenging projects that I worked on promoting the Caribbean and Mexican luxury resort brands. 

Influential Connections

Meanwhile I was building Always A Brunette, I attended a networking event hosted by Philadelphia Chamber of Commerce’s Young Professional Network (YPN) and it was sponsored by The Kimmel Center. The representative was a senior leader at The Kimmel Center, and they were introducing the concept of Philadelphia International Festival of the Arts (PIFA). I was intrigued about it because I have a strong passion for the arts, and I was looking for unique content to write about on my new blog. They were calling for people to be part of their ‘Army of Bloggers’ and I applied. To my surprise, it was a paid position. I was required to post a certain number of blog posts around the timing of the festival and they gave me a check for more than one thousand dollars. I forget the exact amount, but I know at the time for me it was significant because I was only 27 years old.  I was so fortunate that they took a chance on me. I was not established as a blogger but I fit the demographic they were looking for and I was serving as a board member at Philadelphia's Magic Gardens at the time so that helped make me creditable. It was 2011, the first-ever three-week city-wide arts festival and it has continued to come back to the city every two years. In 2011 the word ‘influencer’ was not used very widely but in hindsight, I was a pioneer paid influencer for a digital campaign in their ‘Army of Bloggers’.

In addition to the serendipitous connection to PIFA, I also used my connections as a member of Philadelphia Public Relations Association (PPRA) to source other content for my blog.  I was approached by an account executive at Divine + Powers to feature some of their clients. (Now the firm is called Divine + Partners.) One of their clients was Tiffany & Co. I shared a few blogs about their anniversary collection and event at the Walnut Street store and as payment they gave me a small necklace that I just adored. Other clients I wrote about for them new restaurants. 

I also shared personal recaps of events I attended, product reviews for Influenster and details about my triathlon training. I completed five sprint triathlons in my twenties and those achievements made engaging blog posts. I am still active and run and participate in 5K and 10K road races but my triathlon days have taken a break. One day I think I'll complete another but you won't find that content popping up anytime soon. 

All the while, I did not have a strategy in place. I did take someone’s advice at the time and purchase the domain name AlwaysAbrunette.com on GoDaddy.com. I did it out of fear that someone else would take it and I would look like a copy-cat. However, I didn’t even get around to initiated using that domain name as the blog’s URL.  ninamariepr.blogspot.com/ is what was used back when it launched and I’ll continue to use that for now.

When competing in a triathlon I always found the most difficult part to be the transition. Your personal best time could be the matter of how quickly you tie your sneakers for the run after swimming or how fast you fasten your bike helmet. 

Pivotal Moments Growing My Network

Transitions are something all people need to accept and prepare for, not just triathletes. 

In 2014 I went dark on the blog because I was extremely busy with my new job as marketing manager at Brûlée Catering, a GuestCounts Hospitality owned company at the time. I really carved out a niche for myself in the hospitality world, but I wanted to be working in Philadelphia rather than commuting to Newtown Square to AMResort’s offices. The position at Brûlée transformed my career and I also met my husband while working that job! Meeting and falling in love with the executive pastry chef, James at work the best work perk ever proving that timing is everything!

Was it a coincidence that I blogged about GuestCount’s restaurant and bar, Square Peg on Walnut Street months before applying to the job and being interviewed? It was. I literally stumbled into the bar with friends around closing time one night and struck up a conversation with their bartender. He invited me back to blog about their menu when their kitchen was open.  While I was there, I am certain that the owner was also at the bar, but he didn’t introduce himself to me. I don’t think he wanted to tip me off that he was overseeing the operations while I was blogging.   The owner ended up being my boss for a few years and a guest at my wedding to James.

The New Beginning

Fast forward to today, the end of 2019. That restaurant on Walnut Street has been closed for several years. GuestCounts Hospitality sold Brûlée Catering to Spectra by Comcast Spectacor in 2017 and I now work as communications manager for the company that now stands up independently, Spectra.

I have grown tremendously both personally and professionally in the past few years. James, the executive pastry chef I met at Brûlée Catering, became my husband in March of 2017. I served as PPRA’s President, September 2018 to June, 2019, where I started as a volunteer early in my career. I’m now giving back to the next generation of public relation practitioners as an adjunct instructor at Temple University’s Klein College of Media and Communication for the second semester teaching a course called Digital Analytics for Public Relations. One of the first lessons I teach them is that you need a strategic plan and to set objectives in order to measure successful campaigns. Clearly, I don’t want them to make the same mistakes that I did early on in my career.

And to go completely full-circle, I’m currently enrolled as student at Cabrini University pursuing a graduate-level certificate for Integrated Social Media. Cabrini is where I earned my Bachelor of Arts in English/Communication in 2006. The course I’m taking inspired the transformation of this blog.

I truly don’t think I would be where I am today if I didn’t take a chance and start blogging back in 2011. Nina’s Network will be a new space for me to share insight and tips to help others who are just as ambitions as that wide-eyed twenty-something year old that launched Always A Brunette. Welcome to my world, Nina’s Network!