1888

Burrelle's® Press Clipping Bureau formed in New York City after founder Frank Burrelle overheard two businessmen lament the difficulty of keeping up with the news in the papers. Burrelle and his wife transformed their kitchen table to a press clipping bureau, pulling from New York City newspapers the news of interest to his customers. For this service, Burrelle's charged three cents per clip (newspapers cost two cents back then). The company primarily served individual customers in the early days -- New York's movers and shakers whose goings-on were reported by the city's dozen or so newspapers.

In Boston of the same year, Boston Globe employee Robert Luce recruited his brother Linn Luce to help with what he envisioned as a side business in news clippings. For the first few weeks, Linn did it all -- the reading, the cutting, and the mailing. In less than six months, business was booming, other employees were added to the staff, and Robert Luce left the Boston Globe to focus full time on the clipping business.

1912

After the deaths of founders Frank and Nellie Burrelle, Arthur Wynne took over Burrelle's Clipping Service.

1935

Burrelle's Clipping Service achieved full national newspaper coverage.

1940

Burrelle's Clipping Service added magazine coverage.

1951

Southwest Clippings, owned by the French family, purchases Luce Press Clippings from Harvard, which had owned the business after Robert Luce's death.

1960

Arthur Wynne, Jr. became a partner in [newly renamed] Burrelle's Information Services®.

1970

Burrelle's added broadcast and wire service coverage.

1974

Robert C. Waggoner became a partner in Burrelle's.

1980

Burrelle's introduced media analysis services, long before executives expected ROI from PR efforts.

1984

Burrelle's created Express®, a service that sent the day's headlines and brief news summaries to busy execs. Express used a newfangled technology called the FAX machine. In some cases, Burrelle's salespeople had to first explain what a FAX machine was before touting the advantages of Express.

1994

Burrelle's introduces the NewsAlert online monitoring service, based on electronic newspapers, wire services, and broadcast content. Burrelle's entered into its first use agreement with a publication, establishing the company as a leader in copyright compliance in the media monitoring arena.

2003

Burrelle's Information Service and Luce Press Clippings merged, forming BurrellesLuce®.

2007

BurrellesLuce launched BurrellesLuce 2.0®, the industry standard for easy, affordable online access to media monitoring and measurement content and tools. BurrellesLuce expands blog monitoring to cover more than 50 million sites.

2008

BurrellesLuce launches the first turnkey copyright compliance program for media relations professionals.

BurrellesLuce celebrated its 120th year of excellence in media monitoring.

Fresh Ideas, BurrellesLuce corporate blog, launches.

2009

BurrellesLuce officially launches BurrellesLuce iMonitor®, its self-guided media monitoring tool that powers instant searches covering the most local, national, and international news from free and subscription sources, including social media.