Masons Yorkshire Gin hires Golley Slater

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Golley Slater PR North has won a PR brief from Masons Yorkshire Gin and had its contract with pub operator New World Trading Company extended to include a new location opening in York.

Golley Slater Masons Yorkshire Gin

Masons Yorkshire Gin

Masons Yorkshire Gin is a local supplier that will be stocked in the new Leeds John Lewis. Golley Slater is also handling the launch of  the new store, which will open in October.

The team at Masons Yorkshire Gin brought in Leeds-based Golley Slater PR North after being impressed with its work on John Lewis’ “Locally Made” range, which included Masons Yorkshire Gin.

Eileen Stretton, MD at Golley Slater PR North, said: “We were thrilled to work with Masons Yorkshire Gin as part of its relationship with John Lewis. And to work with such a lovely, local, success story to promote its growing business nationally is a great opportunity – and great gin and tonics now come as an added perk at Golley Slater.”

Golley Slater was first appointed by New World Trading Company in March to handle the consumer comms for The Botanist, its Leeds site.

After being invited to competitively pitch for a new project, the agency will now work on the launch of a site in York.

Stretton said: “To build on our existing relationship with the New World Trading Company for another Yorkshire opening is really exciting for us. The bar in Leeds is already a favourite Golley haunt, and what can be better than promoting a business that is all about fantastic food and incredible cocktails?”

Seetec calls in Down At The Social

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Business service provider Seetec has brought in Down At The Social to handle its PR and comms for the North West.

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The team at Down At The Social

Seetec, which was founded in 1984, is one the largest employee-owned business service providers across welfare, skills, justice and public services in the UK and Ireland.

Down At The Social, which is based in MediaCityUK, Salford, will promote the services Seetec provides for individuals looking to get back into employment following long periods out of work, with a series of case studies and success stories.

Helen Tomlinson, director of welfare at Seetec, said: “We connected with the team at Down At The Social straight away, and believe that their knowledge and expertise within the region will mean this will be a great success. With this campaign we want to encourage both businesses and individuals to engage with us and let us show them how the invaluable support our team provides can change their lives.”

Daisy Whitehouse, MD at Down At The Social, said: “Seetec is great business to work with purely for the inspiring stories and the community support it gives. It’s a feel good client! We’re looking forward to helping it spread the word to everyone across the North West.”

TAG Heuer appoints Pitch to launch Premier League partnership

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TAG Heuer has appointed Pitch Partnerships, the new sponsorship division of Pitch PR, to launch the luxury watch brand’s partnership with the Premier League.

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A Tag Heuer substitution board

TAG Heuer, part of the LVMH Group, recently became the first “official timekeeper” of the Premier League. As part of the agreement, Premier League referees are now keeping time with the TAG Heuer Connected watch, with fourth officials using Tag Heuer substitution boards during matches.

Following a competitive pitch process, Pitch Partnerships has been chosen to create a distinctive activation strategy that will use TAG Heuer assets to engage football fans through social, digital, PR and experiential, promoting its “Don’t Crack Under Pressure” brand philosophy.

TAG Heuer’s brand presence in football currently includes partnerships with the German Bundesliga, MLS, Chinese Super League and Leicester City’s manager Claudio Ranieri.

Emelie De Vitis, marketing and retail director at Tag Heuer, said: “Pitch showed us it has the right insight and expertise to activate our partnership with the Premier League. We will be working collaboratively with Pitch to solidify our presence in football this season and engage fans through experiential and social activity.”

Gavin Peters, director of Pitch Partnerships, said: “We are thrilled to be working with a brand of TAG Heuer’s stature, especially at this exciting time as it embarks on a new journey into the football world with the Premier League partnership. Given the fantastic new product range and values associated with the brand, we are delighted to be working with TAG Heuer to help bring together technology, luxury and the passion of football.”

Last week, specialist recruitment company Hays appointed Pitch to raise the profile of its partnership with Manchester City Football Club.

Spreckley opens in Stirling to target Scotland’s tech sector

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PR consultancy Spreckley is looking to capitalise on the growing digital technology sector in Scotland with the opening of a satellite office in Stirling.

Nick Spreckley

Nick Bird

The central location will allow Spreckley to offer services to tech hubs in Glasgow, Edinburgh, Dundee, Inverness and Aberdeen. Its London office opens up international markets.

Nick Bird, account director, leads Spreckley Scotland. He said: “Confidence and innovation have been critical to the success seen in Scotland’s tech market. The number of start-up technology companies springing up in the likes of Edinburgh, Glasgow and other major Scottish cites is increasing rapidly. Companies such as Skyscanner and FanDuel have now grown to become global heavyweights.

“Alongside this upsurge in new and innovative companies, we are also seeing an increase in global technology names setting up operations in the region. Microsoft, Apple and Amazon all have premises in cities such as Edinburgh. For Spreckley this represents an opportunity to capitalise on this, and expand our portfolio to access the growing number of tech specialist’s north of the border.”

According to Scottish Development International, the nation’s tech sector has grown 43.4% over the last five years, a level of growth surpassed only by London.

Richard Merrin, managing director of Spreckley, added: “Often there is a tendency to bypass regional markets in favour of staying loyal to cities such as London and Manchester – doing so means huge, untapped potential is being overlooked. We want to address this by delivering a region-wide strategy that places a strong emphasis on business development among major tech hubs such as Scotland with potential to expand further into other areas within the UK.”

 

Redleaf Communications appointed by Work Avenue

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Emma Kane

Redleaf Communications has been appointed to help philanthropic organisation Work Avenue raise its profile.

Work Avenue helps people at all stages of life to get into work and be financially independent, with a positive outcome for the individuals, their families and society as a whole.

Emma Kane, chief executive at Redleaf, will lead on the account alongside senior account manager Rishi Banerjee and account executive Sofie Ford.

Kane said: “We are delighted to have been appointed to work with Work Avenue. The ethos behind Work Avenue is just inspiring and something I strongly believe – nobody should be denied their dreams and aspirations.

“We are looking forward to working with CEO Shraga Zaltzman and his team to educate the market and raise its awareness as the business enters its next stage of growth.”

Work Avenue provides business guidance, training and mentoring to help people to find work. The organisation also partners with Start Up Loans to provide financial support to growing businesses.

TOMRA appoints Brand8 PR to global corporate brief

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TOMRA, an innovative resource, manufacturing and recycling solutions business with an HQ in Norway, has appointed Leeds-based Brand8 PR to deliver a global corporate PR strategy.

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Rob Smith

TOMRA, which says it provides “sensor-based solutions for optimal resource productivity”, is listed on the Oslo Stock Exchange and wants Brand8 PR to raise the profile of key executives and deliver integrated media relations and content marketing activity.

Brand8 PR’s managing director, Rob Smith, has worked with TOMRA’s recycling, food and mining sensor-based sorting system businesses since 2009, so was asked to put forward proposals for the new corporate PR brief.

He said: “We’re immensely proud to have been appointed to handle TOMRA’s global corporate PR brief. It is a worldwide market leader and technology innovator that improves yields from scarce resources, enhances its customers’ profitability and benefits the global environment.”

Lorraine Dundon, TOMRA’s VP, head of group brand and corporate communications, added: “We were impressed by the clarity of Brand8 PR’s strategic thinking and the fact that it is firmly rooted in achieving our commercial and reputational objectives.

“The agency has a deep understanding of our business and has demonstrated its ability to work on our behalf globally. We are very pleased to be further developing our relationship with Brand8 PR and look forward to the agency supporting us as we continue to deliver our vision of leading the resource revolution.”

Opinion: ‘BuzzFeed speak’ leads the media agenda

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Traditional media reporting has taken its lead from social media and ‘BuzzFeed speak’ this summer, notes Howard Bowden, media trainer and co-founder of Generation. He explains how this trend will affect media relations.

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Howard Bowden

“No such thing as an old story, no such thing as a new story.” It’s a great quote – from ex-Metro editor Kenny Campbell – and I’ve been starting my media training sessions with it.

It’s a reminder that pretty much every news story has already been done, which is a good starting point for any media relations activity.

But, while stories remain the same, the style in which they are reported changes over time as journalistic nuances, reportage styles and media platforms develop.

Three years ago, Rory Cellan-Jones, the BBC technology correspondent, identified BuzzFeed as ‘the death/saviour of news’ – and in recent weeks it feels like the inevitable merging of traditional media reporting styles with both social media speak and BuzzFeed-type nuances has accelerated dramatically.

When The Sun tweeted a recent story about a man who tried swapping his partner for a festival ticket, the tweet began ‘Seriously, WTF?’ – which, unlike a traditional headline, has no reference to the story, and is simply there to encourage click-through:

A few weeks later, The Sun ran a story about a bullied schoolgirl who became a beauty queen, with a tweet which began ‘Wow!’. Just, wow. You could argue that the same word should be at the start of every headline (‘Wow! Junior doctors to go on strike’, ‘Wow! The nationals are now using unrelated exclamations in headlines’, etc.):

Meanwhile, the BBC has recently broken not one, but two, traditional rules of journalism with its daily ‘3 things we love today’ section on the homepage. In theory, you should always write numbers below ‘10’ as words and always spell out any number when it starts a sentence.

BBC headlines have also undergone a BuzzFeed-style makeover. In my 12 Commandments of Writing A Press Release training session, I ask people to guess from where I’ve taken a selection of headlines, and no-one (yet) has identified that ‘Internet has freaked over Harry Styles hair cut’ was a BBC headline earlier this year.

What of BuzzFeed itself?

Recent stories Tweeted, at the time of writing, range from ‘Here’s what happened when we tested 5 Pinterest nail-drying hacks’ to ‘These women posted vacations on Insta (sic) before their huge $30 million coke bust’, both of which feel pretty mainstream media in 2016. Although, surely, it will take a while before good old fashioned Anglo-Saxon swear words make it into media headlines:

So, should we be putting press releases through a BuzzFeed filter, adding WTFs, Wows and four-letter words before selling-in to the media?

No. Not yet, anyway. The key is always to demonstrate to a journalist that you understand their world – so give them stories about Life Hacks, create content around people (the best stories are about people, right?) doing stuff on social media which your client can own, and feel free to put a (single) word in capitals in your headline, even if you’re going after the broadsheets. It’s how news works in 2016.

The bottom line for media relations: copy, and steal ideas from, whatever media you’re going after – and if it’s the nationals, read the papers daily, whether it’s hard copies, online or on Twitter. You don’t already? Seriously, WTF?

  • Howard Bowden is a freelance media trainer and co-founder of Generation. His career has included content roles at 3 Monkeys and Clarion and senior PR roles for Vue and Walt Disney.

VPC Speciality Lending Investments appoints MHP

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Mark Lunn

VPC Speciality Lending Investments PLC has appointed MHP Communications as its financial public relations and corporate affairs adviser.

VPC Speciality Lending Investments is a financier to online lending platforms. The company listed on the main market of the London Stock Exchange last year.

Director Mark Lunn and managing director Tim Rowntree will lead the MHP team and report to Brendan Carroll, senior partner at Victory Park Capital Advisors, LLC, VPC Speciality Lending Investment’s SEC-registered investment adviser.

Carroll said: “VSL seeks to gain attractive returns for our shareholders by investing across a diverse portfolio of online lending Platforms.

“We appointed MHP because of its expertise in, and understanding of, the UK financial market in the investment companies sector. We were impressed by the team’s knowledge of the UK media and regulatory landscape and believe they are best-positioned to help us grow our business in-line with our corporate objectives.”

SAIBR PR to launch children’s store Me & Buddy

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Me & Buddy, a “children’s lifestyle store”, has appointed parenting and children’s comms specialist SAIBR PR to handle its UK consumer launch.

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Me & Buddy

Me & Buddy is the brainchild of Madeline Walsh, mum of Darcy and Cillian. Buddy is the nickname she gives both of her children.

SAIBR PR’s campaign will include editorial promotional activity with leading parenting titles, blogger ambassadors, a Christmas campaign and interiors press activity.

Walsh explained: “When parents go from being ‘Me’ to ‘Me & Buddy’, I believe we should be able to buy baby and toddler products that fit into our own lifestyles. So much changes when you have children but your style, and that of your home, don’t have to.”

Me & Buddy will sell more than 50 “award winning and emerging brands”, which produce design-led gifts for babies and toddlers.

She added: “We picked SAIBR because of its depth of knowledge of parenting media and experience of working with the most influential lifestyle bloggers. We feel it has the expertise to successfully manage and help grow Me & Buddy into a well established and much loved family brand.”

Bridget Jacottet, director at SAIBR PR, will lead the account.

Jacottet commented: “Me & Buddy is a brand new children’s lifestyle brand tapping into the desire of parents to have not only the best products for their babies and toddlers but the most aesthetically pleasing. We are working with leading parenting and lifestyle media to showcase the best that Me & Buddy has to offer for style conscious parents.”

Full Fat briefed to launch Boxpark Croydon

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Full Fat has been brought in to develop a launch campaign for Boxpark Croydon, which is the brand’s first food and drink-focused location due to open in late October.

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The design for Boxpark Croydon

Boxpark, which was founded by CEO Roger Wade, is constructed of stripped and refitted shipping containers, featuring “low risk pop-up stores” with a mix of fashion and lifestyle brands, galleries, cafés and restaurants.

It first opened in London’s Shoreditch in 2011.

Full Fat, which won the account following a competitive pitch, will use its experience within the food, drink and live entertainment sectors to raise the profile of the new Croydon location.

Wade said: “We are delighted to be working with Full Fat on the launch of Boxpark Croydon. The full fat team has a proven track record of launching successful street food concepts like Street Feast’s Merchant Yard and KERB Camden, they are perfect fit for Boxpark.”

Full Fat MD Dan Walsh added: “It’s a real privilege to have been appointed to handle the launch of Boxpark Croydon, which once open is going to change the landscape of an often over-looked part of London. The campaign comes with some interesting challenges to overcome and we’re looking forward to getting stuck in alongside the fantastic team at Boxpark.”