PR WITH A PURPOSE | Kim Ring has a knack for crafting the right message to reach a variety of audiences. In addition to her myriad responsibilities as communications director for ASI Food Safety, she has also been a champion for the very personal mission of raising awareness about domestic violence.
PR WITH A PURPOSE | Kim Ring has a knack for crafting the right message to reach a variety of audiences. In addition to her myriad responsibilities as communications director for ASI Food Safety, she has also been a champion for the very personal mission of raising awareness about domestic violence. Kim Ring has had a successful career as a public relations professional, working both as a freelancer and for PR agencies, as well as most recently joining ASI Food Safety as its in-house director of communications.
But beyond her experience in the cannabis and food safety sectors, Ring’s passion and lasting legacy are putting her communications skills to good use, namely in raising awareness about domestic violence.
And though it puts her professional skills to use, it’s something she does pro bono — and probably will for as long as she’s able.
“It’s about giving a voice to the voiceless,” she says.
After being involved in an abusive relationship herself, Ring connected with a family member who had been in a similar situation and was ready to open up about her trauma. While there are numerous nonprofits operating as domestic violence resources, Ring wanted to focus on the actual problem in society and the lack of solutions. For example, she says, roughly 40% of victims’ calls to domestic violence hotlines go unanswered. But what she found was getting news agencies to pay attention to domestic violence has been a major challenge.
“It’s the hardest thing I’ve ever had to get media coverage for,” she says, “Even when it’s timely in the news, my pitch is on point and I have everything to back up a good story, it just doesn’t get a lot of traction. When it comes to solutions to the problem, it’s like the story doesn’t exist. People don’t want to touch it with a 10-foot pole for some reason.”
Through her advocacy work, she was selected to write a chapter in the book “Agents of Social Change: Shifting & Eradicating the Inequities Plaguing Our World Today,” which was published in 2024.
“Writing that chapter was like a therapy session because I hadn’t thought about a lot of that stuff in a while, and I had been trying to push it out of my brain,” Ring says.
Since joining ASI, her role has evolved from specifically focusing on PR to more broad communications and marketing. In addition to providing food safety auditing, training and consulting, ASI oversees the Cannabis Safety & Quality certification program. The position gives Ring a foothold in both cannabis and the food safety realm, which became important to her after being diagnosed with Celiac disease in college and learning quickly the difference between gluten-free certified and something that’s just labeled gluten-free.
Ring is currently helping the company launch CSQ 2.0, a facelift of the standards program that has become a guiding force for safeguarding the cannabis supply chain, as well as newly developed standards for deli-style retail.
“It’s perfect because I couldn’t say goodbye to the cannabis industry,” she says. “I started out in financial services PR, which was very bland, nothing creative or out of the box. In cannabis, everything is outside-the-box and you can have fun with it.”