Back during the summer of '07, I was about to head out for the day and heard a ting noise, indicating a new free trial request. We get quite a few of these, but my curiousity peaked when I saw the company listed: Hard Rock Cafe. Obviously a name that I recognized, I printed it out and mentioned it to one of the co-owners in one of those, "Wow...look who might be interested in us" conversations that leads to a lot of daydreaming and wonder.

A lot of discussion, a request-for-proposal document and almost six months later, I hadn't heard anything back and had figured that we didn't get the bid. It was my first big project I had worked on since coming on board in the spring of last year, so I was bummed. We had worked countless hours on the bid, went down to Hard Rock Boston twice to get the feel of who they really were and made our proposal a bit more unique than the typical Microsoft Word document some of our competitors probably did. But I thought it was all for naught and had that feeling you get when you meet a girl, get her number and then never go out on the date. Like in those situations, I had already moved on, albeit not fully content about never knowing what had happened to submerge the connection.

Then one chilly December day, I was on my way to our weekly Executive Meeting and the phone rang. It was my contact from Hard Rock and I figured this was the "Thanks, but no thanks" closure call I was looking for. It was exactly the opposite; Hard Rock wanted to work with SendLabs and had approved our RFP. As calm as I could muster, I went through the next steps and happily headed into our co-owner Brett's office to tell him the big news. I have done a lot in my life (met sports icons, put on All-Star Games, got national attention for promotions), but that moment will stick with me forever. Less than a year after working in email marketing for the first time, I had helped snag a big one. It still hasn't fully sunk yet and it's March of 2008.

So today, we formally announced that Hard Rock Cafe (that of the kickrestaurants, nightclubs, casinos and more) will utilize us for our self-service software and Campaign Preview. They represent one of the most recognizable logos and brands in the world and they saw something in us that worked with what they're trying to accomplish. It's been a great arrangement thus far and we expect 2008 to be the first milestone for them among many we'll experience together over the years. To us, this is another opportunity to show why we are better and to challenge ourselves to always be better.

When this crazy interactive company began years ago, the goal was never to dominate the industry but rather to be a force in it and work with clients who would bring as much to the table as we would. With Hard Rock Cafe joining an already solid stable of marketers and savvy minds from around the world, the reasons for being excited to come into work every day have increased again.

To view the release, click here.