Categories: OLD Media Moves

Atlanta paper's Home Depot reporter resigns — for Home Depot job

Patti Bond, a business reporter who covered Home Depot for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, resigned on Wednesday for an internal communications job at the world’s largest home improvement retailer.

Bond said, “It all came together very quickly and I had to give notice here earlier than I normally would have because of the sensitivity. It’s strictly internal — no external, PR or media interaction.”

Bond was one of the rare business reporters who had actually spent time in the business world. She worked a decade in banking and accounting before returning to school to get a journalism degree from the University of Florida.

Bond starts her new job on Jan. 7. A replacement has not been named. Bond had been at the paper for a decade, covering retailing and business trends and strategies. Her resignation follows the departure of the paper’s Coke reporter, Duane Stanford, last month, for a job at Bloomberg News.

For Home Depot, Bond will be an editor and writer for a new employee newsletter that is launching in February, and do some executive communications.

Disclosure: I covered Home Depot for the AJC, wrote a book about Home Depot, and have also talked to Bond every once in a while about stories.

Chris Roush

Chris Roush was the dean of the School of Communications at Quinnipiac University in Hamden, Connecticut. He was previously Walter E. Hussman Sr. Distinguished Professor in business journalism at UNC-Chapel Hill. He is a former business journalist for Bloomberg News, Businessweek, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, The Tampa Tribune and the Sarasota Herald-Tribune. He is the author of the leading business reporting textbook "Show me the Money: Writing Business and Economics Stories for Mass Communication" and "Thinking Things Over," a biography of former Wall Street Journal editor Vermont Royster.

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View Comments

Sellout says:
December 20, 2007 at 4:24 pm
Newsflash: Reporters leave newspapers to go into PR.
Next thing you know you'll tell us Fox News is "right-leaning"
F.A. Right says:
December 20, 2007 at 10:13 pm
And the brain drain continues at the AJC. It's amazing the experience and expertise that have left, either on their own or through forced buyouts, since the reorganization was announced. And still no management changes. But that would be an admission that the great vision for an all-new news product may not be so great after all.
Plogiston says:
December 21, 2007 at 4:05 am
Didn't the AJC eliminate 80 newsroom jobs this year alone?
I can't blame any reporter who has a chance to take a steady job in industry, rather than wait to find out if they're next to go.
jason says:
December 21, 2007 at 8:39 am
The larger issue is whether she was talking to Home Depot about a job at the same time that she was covering them for the AJC. She must have, of course, but it'd be good to confront her with that.
Awilda says:
December 21, 2007 at 11:31 am
I would like to personally speak with Ms. Bond. I suggest she implements a suggestion box in her Newsletter on "How to improve Customer Service. I live in Houston, Texas and believe me their Customer Service particularly in one store is "deplorable" to put it mildly!!
Awilda from Houston 281-558-7452.
Floore says:
December 21, 2007 at 2:13 pm
no, Jason, the larger issue is NOT when she began talking to home depot. the larger issue is why newspapers are cutting their own throats by slashing their expertise and quality and eliminating their institutional memory. the larger issue is why newspaper web sites are trying to be tv and radio stations.
the larger issue is why newspapers are driving "readers" to their web sites that aren't generating much money. the larger issue is why newspapers are incapable of promoting and marketing themselves effectively when they have news and information to sell
the larger issue is why newspapers are failing to give customers information they want and news they need.
another former AJCer says:
December 21, 2007 at 6:06 pm
Brain drain indeed. What's often forgotten in the commentary on the number of people who took the buyouts is how many people, like Patti, didn't buy out or resign, but did vote with their feet and leave - probably more than two dozen over two years. Most of them were the ones the management should have tried hardest to hold on to: smartest, brightest, most entrepreneurial, deepest-sourced.
heywood j says:
December 21, 2007 at 8:14 pm
yeah, yeah, yeah. my heart is bleeding... let's face the facts: the AJC hasn't been a great paper for YEARS.
Sure, a bunch of quality journalists have left in the past two years -- but c'mon: who are we kidding? the AJC of two years ago still stunk. 5 years ago: still stunk.
It's been YEARS since they were putting out quality journalism.
So, yes, my heart bleeds for the current state of affairs -- but for anyone who has read this paper they know it's been a rag for a long time.
EJA says:
December 21, 2007 at 9:18 pm
Last week Patti wrote some glowing articles in AJC about Home Depot's exciting new marketing venture into "new media". It was a contest where people submitted creative videos describing what they would do if they won the grand prize -- a $25,000 gift card.
The contest is over now, and Home Depot made an absolute mess of it. The winning submission had clearly violated rules about copyright infringement, and other contestants where understandably upset. Home Depot's solution? Let the winning entry re-edit their video to conform to the rules. Check out the feedback thread on the contest sight and you'll see what a wonderful job the Depot did in their first "new media" venture.
And Patti's works for them now so there won't be any pesky follow-up articles to worry about. Nice.
american says:
December 22, 2007 at 1:11 pm
That contest site is:
http://youtube.com/group/thdgiftcards