Public Relations
While earning his law degree at Widener University, Tierney founded Tierney & Company Public Relations in 1984, which he financed on his credit card. In 1986, he sold the company to Lewis Gilman & Kynett. Tierney stayed with Lewis Gilman & Kynett and by the time he turned twenty-nine he had become president and CEO of the public relations division. In 1989, he left Lewis Gilman & Kynett and founded Tierney Group, another public relations company, with just three people. One of those people remembers Tierney's saying "We need to look at what everyone else is charging and charge our clients $15 an hour more." When told that was crazy Tierney responded, "We're going to be the best at what we do. We need to charge people accordingly." The company quickly grew with billings of US$3.5 million and thirty-five employees in offices in three cities.
In 1994 Tierney, in association with Chicago-based True North Communications, made a deal with Foote, Cone & Belding Communications to take control of FCB Philadelphia. FCB Philadelphia, which up to 1989 was Lewis Gilman & Kynett, was renamed FCB/Tierney in May 1994 and renamed again in 1995 to Tierney & Partners. Tierney built the company into one of the largest public relations and advertising firms in the Mid Atlantic. Tierney's clients included IBM, McDonald's, Verizon, PECO Energy and the Pennsylvania Lottery. The company created an award winning advertising campaign for Verizon starring James Earl Jones and the slogan "Philadelphia: The place that loves you back" for the Greater Philadelphia Tourism Marketing Corporation. Other advertising campaigns included wrapping a giant hoagie around Philadelphia City Hall to promote Wawa Food Markets and an ad campaign to prevent a hostile takeover of PECO Energy by Enron.
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