Cue the music!
Blue Monday. How does it feel?
If the answer is “fine, actually,” congratulations, you’ve just survived a completely made-up concept invented by a PR agency in 2004 and politely humoured by the media ever since.
Yes, really.
Blue Monday wasn’t discovered by scientists. It wasn’t unearthed by psychologists.
It was created, named, packaged, and handed to newsrooms at a time of year when everyone’s skint, tired, and quietly unimpressed with their New Year’s resolutions.
And to be fair, it worked! 
Every January it rolls back around, usually with a slightly embarrassed “so-called” attached, but covered all the same. Because it’s familiar. It’s easy. And it feels emotionally true enough to run with.
That’s the bit worth paying attention to.
Because if the media is still running with that, imagine what they’d do with something you’d actually thought through.
No, I’m not launching Cheery Tuesday (although I’ve seen worse ideas make the papers).
But Blue Monday is a useful reminder that PR isn’t just about reacting to what’s already out there. It’s about creating moments, naming problems, framing ideas, and giving journalists something they can use without too much effort.
Which brings me neatly to this: I’ve built a little AI gizmo called Dr Spin.
Not to “do PR for you”. And definitely not to spit out press releases.
Dr Spin does something much simpler (and more useful): it asks the kind of awkward, clarifying questions a decent PR person would ask before inventing something like Blue Monday in the first place.
If you’ve ever caught yourself thinking, “We don’t really have a story”, that’s exactly where it starts.
If you’re wondering what you could create, own, or reframe in 2026, go and have a conversation with virtual me!
Worst case? You’ll think a bit differently about your story.
Best case? You’ll stop waiting for the calendar and start giving the media something to work with.
And that’s usually where good PR actually begins.
OK now I’ve got that song properly stuck in my head! Sorry!