Corkers Crisps renews Clementine Communications partnership

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Corkers Crisps has chosen Clementine Communications to handle its trade and consumer relations initiatives in 2017.

Clementine Communications helped Corkers launch the first ever packet of crisps into space

The two companies have a long history of working together, with previous collaborations including the launch of the first packet of crisps into space and the creation of the world’s largest packet of crisps.

Clementine will also facilitate interviews with Corkers’ senior spokespeople and assist with the launch of a brand new product line.

David Glennan, Corkers’ MD, said: “We are delighted to once again be collaborating with Clementine Communications. We have formed a strong partnership and it’s going to be fun working together to take the brand and business to the next level.”

Simon Mowbray re-joins Richmond Towers

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Former newspaper and trade journalist Simon Mowbray has re-joined Richmond Towers Communications as food and drink director.

Simon Mowbray

Mowbray returns to the Soho-based agency after five years of providing consultancy to a number of agencies, suppliers and FMCG brands, including General Mills, Pernod Ricard, British Soft Drinks Association, Mary Berry’s Foods and Ella’s Kitchen.

A media trainer and crisis specialist, Mowbray’s first job in PR was as editorial director at Richmond Towers Communications, which he first joined in 2006 following a five-year spell as marketing editor, then news editor, at The Grocer.

Prior to that he was consumer affairs correspondent at the Press Association and cut his teeth in journalism at the Birmingham Post & Mail group of newspapers.

In his new role as food and drink director, Mowbray will work closely with Richmond Towers CEO Rob Metcalfe and MD Nikki Thomson to grow the agency’s food and drink divisions.

Metcalfe said: “It’s great to have Simon back in the fold at such an exciting time in our development. We have just won large accounts for California Walnuts and another generic fresh produce client following competitive pitches, while our drinks clients include Irish Distillers, Pernod Ricard and Global Brands.

“Simon’s experience across both consumer and B2B media has continued to be a valuable resource for our teams to draw on over the years, so it is very pleasing to have him back in a senior role within the agency.”

Mowbray added: “I’m delighted to be back working with Rob, Nikki and the rest of the team on such an impressive portfolio of clients.”

Aruba expands remit with WE Communications

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Networking solution provider Aruba, a Hewlett Packard Enterprise company, has expanded its remit with WE Communications to now cover 20 markets across Asia, LATAM and EMEA.

Aruba began its relationship with WE Communications – then Waggener Edstrom – in December 2013, with the WE London office carrying out an EMEA content and campaign management brief in the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Spain and South Africa.

This has now extended to include a regional APAC hub in Singapore that manages owned and partner offices in SEA, China, Hong Kong, India, in addition to extending its remit across LATAM markets including Brazil and Mexico.

This brief has since increased to incorporate design, video production, insights and analytics. WE has played a key role in Aruba’s #GenMobile campaign, a multi-stage, multi-year global campaign consisting of global studies, partnerships, events, social, lead-gen activities and award wins.

Chris Kozup, vice president of marketing at Aruba, said: “Working with WE has allowed us to bridge our PR efforts into marketing, taking us from reputation management to demand generation and successfully increasing the profile of marketing within the business. Everyone from our CEO to our sales team is comfortable talking about the #GenMobile narrative.”

He continued: “We expanded our remit with WE because they have taken the time to understand our business and technology, and perhaps most importantly, our audiences, and they are committed to developing creative campaigns and content that drive demand.”

Alan VanderMolen, president, international at WE, added: “We’re are so proud of our relationship with Aruba and delighted that our partnership has expanded into Asia and LATAM. We look forward to leveraging our integrated campaign expertise to help Aruba continue expanding its leadership position in the move to the Digital Workplace.”

M&C Saatchi PR wins Virgin Active brief

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M&C Saatchi PR has been named as the retained strategic comms partner for Virgin Active. 

Virgin Active

Virgin Active has briefed M&C Saatchi PR’s UK team to “up the health club’s comms game”, with a mix of social, consumer and corporate PR activity.

The account was won following a competitive pitch.

Robert Cook, MD of Virgin Active, said: “We were looking for an agency that not only matched the passion, energy and ambition of the Virgin Active brand, but could also help us deliver truly integrated and strategic communications.

“In M&C Saatchi PR we found just that; they were able to both tailor their offering to match our needs and embrace our innovative ‘screw it, let’s do it’ attitude, making them the perfect, trusted partner to effectively communicate the nationwide Virgin Active product to both new and existing customers.”

Molly Aldridge, global CEO and co-founder at M&C Saatchi PR, added: “The team’s passion for the sector packed a punch at pitch, and we’re thrilled to now officially welcome Virgin Active to the M&C Saatchi PR family. This win highlights the importance of our ‘driven by passion’ proposition as we continue to grow globally.

“We’re all really excited to start working together, kicking off in full force this month, and I have no doubts that this partnership will see us flex our creative muscles and strengthen this iconic brand as it goes the distance.”

Most read people news on Gorkana News

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Your bitesize update on the latest People News and Moves featured on Gorkana News:

Grayling UK appoints Sarah Scholefield as CEO
Grayling, the integrated global communications company, has appointed Sarah Scholefield as the company’s UK chief executive officer with immediate effect.

 

Infinite Global appoints Cameron Webb as head of branding and creative
Infinite Global has appointed Cameron Webb as head of branding and creative as it looks to expand its creative services offering.

 

Fintech startup Curve names Callum McCaig as its first PR hire
London fintech startup Curve has made its first PR and comms hire with the appointment of Burson-Marsteller’s Callum McCaig, as the business prepares to scale out of ‘beta’ and launch its digital banking platform to the mass market.

 

Tony Langham joins the PRCA Board of Management
The PRCA has appointed Lansons co-founder Tony Langham to its Board of Management – the body which ensures it acts in the best interests of its members and the PR industry.

 

 

Opinion: Why Launch PR is dropping the ‘PR’

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Johnny Pitt, founder of Launch and The Creative Shootout, on what is driving the agency’s new positioning and why it is dropping ‘PR’ from its name.

Johnny Pitt

Central to our being at Launch Towers is a passion for great thinking, and this week sees us focus our agency positioning around what we call ‘real ideas’.

Real ideas are insightful, brave, progressive and defining.  They’re ideas which connect, resonate and motivate – and most importantly, deliver real results.

We’ll also no longer be Launch PR, but just simply Launch, to reflect the integrated nature of our campaigns and the fact that clients are now wanting their PR activity to take off from a broader communications base and be much more inter-disciplinary.  It’s another small but defining moment in our 16 years.

You could say we’ve had to be defining and ahead of time – since we started trading with an industry first model back in 2001 – as we’ve had the challenge of creating ideas for clients against some of the most dramatic events of peace time.

We set up week of 9/11 and have needed to cut through a banking crisis, the worst recession since the Great Depression of the 1930s, elections – and now of course Brexit.  And fake news – or is it actually real?

This has just made being authentic and real in everything we do critical to success. And Launch is simply more authentic and real than Launch PR.

And if the world isn’t dramatic enough – the thinking has also evolved against a media scene which is almost unrecognisable from the day we registered at Companies House.   We’ve said goodbye to the Today newspaper (RIP 1995), the News of the World (2011) with the New Day’s day lasting merely weeks (2016). Saturday and Sunday news desks have merged, paywalls have sprung up and journalists have become ‘all-rounders’.

And though the likes of Google Hangouts, Myspace, Bebo and Quora have also met their Waterloo, we’ve embraced Facebook, Youtube, Twitter and Whatsapp.  They’ve now got 1.86bn, 300 uploads p/min, 800 Tweets p/day and one billion users, respectively, at last count. This means those our clients want to reach are bombarded with messages in a way that was unthinkable just a few years ago.

So, real ideas need to deliver – whatever the brief, budget or sector– be it brand reputation change, sales enquiries, online traffic or almost anything else.  And this of course makes attracting and retaining real talent, critical to success.

CNC appoints Ben Curson as partner

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CNC Communications & Network Consulting (CNC), the global strategic communications consultancy, has promoted Ben Curson to partner with immediate effect.

Ben Curson

A former broadcast journalist, Curson is based in CNC’s London office where he advises on corporate affairs, financial communications, and crisis and reputation management across a range of clients and markets.

Most recently he has led the development of CNC’s cyber security offer, which sees the business working both with professional services partners and directly with companies, helping them to prepare and respond to cyber security incidents.

Bernhard Meising, chief executive officer at CNC, said: “Ben joined CNC in 2015 bringing with him a wealth of experience and invaluable insight to our growing client base. He has been pivotal in successfully leading CNC’s cyber security service with a range of new clients too. Ben is an integral member of our leadership team, valued by clients and colleagues alike, and it gives me great pleasure to welcome him to the partnership.”

Grayling UK appoints Sarah Scholefield as CEO

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Grayling, the integrated global communications company, has appointed Sarah Scholefield as the company’s UK chief executive officer with immediate effect.

Sarah Scholefield

Scholefield was previously Grayling’s managing director, UK & Ireland.

Paul Taaffe, CEO at Huntsworth PLC, said: “Grayling UK continues to emerge from a transformative period and this is absolutely the right time to promote Sarah to her role as Chief Executive of the UK business as we capitalise on the new management and focus she has overseen.

“Grayling represents some world- leading brands; and in the first quarter of 2017 it has added further marquee companies to its roster, as well as making some significant senior hires.  As Chief Executive, Sarah will continue to build and grow the business, supported by the existing management team.”

Scholefield said: “This is a very optimistic time for Grayling in the UK. I am very proud to be leading a team full of creativity, ambition and momentum in all our offices across the UK.  Together, we provide an exceptional service to our clients, which is resulting in award-winning work and big new business wins. We have started 2017 very strongly and I look forward to building on this success moving forward.

firstlight PR named a ‘great place to work’ in the UK’s Best Workplaces ranking

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Today, firstlight PR has been named as one of the UK’s top 20 best places to work by Great Place to Work’s Best Workplaces survey.

The firstlight team

The agency was ranked in the ‘small’ category of the survey which features organisations with 20-49 employees. firstlight is ranked 16th out of the UK’s 70,000 small businesses.

The Best Workplaces’ methodology includes an employee survey and audit into each organisation’s management and HR practices.  The award recognises the strength of firstlight’s leadership and the range of innovative and creative HR policies contributing to a thriving workplace culture.

Paul Davies, founder and managing director at firstlight, said: “Our philosophy is simple – to create an environment that respects, rewards and builds the careers of our people and allows them to deliver exceptional work for our clients.  To be recognised as a ‘great place to work’ for the second year running is a testament to the amazing people we have working with us, and to the unique culture that they have helped to create.”

Tom O’Byrne, Great Place to Work CEO, said: ‘We are delighted to see firstlight on our Best Workplaces list again this year. It is a validation of the strength of their leadership and their commitment to creating the kind of culture which attracts and retains the best talent and where people have pride in what they do and want to do their best. The hallmark of a great workplace like firstlight is that their policies and practices are designed around the employee; this employee focus helps attract and retain the talent essential for driving and sustaining competitive performance.”

Tony Langham joins the PRCA Board of Management

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The PRCA has appointed Lansons co-founder Tony Langham to its Board of Management – the body which ensures it acts in the best interests of its members and the PR industry.

Tony Langham

Langham cofounded Lansons in 1989. He has been advising governments, organisations and companies on their image and reputation for over 30 years. His recent clients include The Co-operative Bank, The FCA and the Isle of Man Government.

He also ran the PRCA’s ‘economics of reputation’ campaign in 2015 and chairs Great British Racing, the horse racing industry’s official promotional body.

“I am really pleased to become a member of the PRCA Board of Management as I’m a huge admirer of the work Francis and his colleagues do,” said Langham. “The PRCA plays a hugely important role in PR and communications and I relish the opportunity to play a part.”

The PRCA’s director general, Francis Ingham said: “It is with great pleasure that we welcome Tony to the PRCA Board of Management, who is a well-respected and much admired figure in the world of corporate communications, reputation management, and crisis communications.”