What we do
Earning attention that drives demand.
You can't outspend the category leader, so you have to be more worth talking about. We're a PR, social and influencer agency based in Manchester, working across the UK with challenger brands in food, drink, hospitality, retail, leisure, travel and consumer services, and the franchise groups scaling across them.
How we work
Intelligence + Ideas + Influence = Impact
Intelligence
We start with your business goals, your audience and what they already care about, before anyone has an idea.
Ideas
Stories your audience wants to hear, built for the press, the feed and the places AI now reads from.
Influence
Media, creators and social working together, so you're seen wherever your buyers already look.
= Impact
Sales, listings, bookings and footfall you can point to.
How we help
Five ways we earn the attention that moves your business.
Start with the one costing you most.
Every market opens once, and the audience you built elsewhere rarely travels with you. We start long before your doors open and carry it through the weeks after, so you open to people who already know who you are.
Proof: Six by Nico had 3,000 reservations in Manchester and almost 5,000 in Liverpool before opening, with covers full from day one.
See also: Six by Nico, Bath Shack, WeBuyBricks
Search has stopped listing and started answering. We build the stories and moments that make you worth mentioning, then put them where journalists, feeds and AI answers are built from.
Proof: Boddingtons back on cask for JW Lees, sold out every week of the launch.
See also: Boddingtons, The Millstone's No 10 of the North
A buyer wants proof your product will sell before they give you the space. We build visible demand and evidence it as we go, so you hand over a proof pack a buyer can act on.
Proof: Macknade's Christmas, £80k of PR-attributed sales plus a hamper that made £28k from 186 units.
Also: Zymurgorium's first major multiple listings with Co-op and Morrisons.
Grow fast and your brand stops looking like one brand. We define the few things you must be known for and build the system that carries them across every site and franchisee.
Proof: Chopstix stayed unmistakable from 50 stores to more than 150, with 1.3bn earned reach in twelve months.
See also: Chopstix
The people who get quoted are the findable ones, not always the ones who know most. We turn what you know into a position worth quoting and build your platform around it.
Proof: Nicky Wake and Chapter 2, 38 pieces of national coverage against a target of 20, then the investment to launch in Australia and the USA.
See also: William Lees-Jones
How you can work with us.
Questions
What people ask us first.
What is a challenger brand?
A business competing against bigger, better-funded names in its category, which usually means it can't win on media spend and has to win on being talked about. Most of the brands you see on our Work page fit that description.
Do you only work in Manchester?
No. We're based in Manchester and the North is home, but we work with brands across the UK, from openings in Gateshead and Colchester to national campaigns.
Do you work with franchise and multi-site groups?
Yes. Keeping a brand consistent across sites and franchisees is one of the five things we do, and Chopstix is the clearest example.
Can you guarantee coverage or results?
No, and you should be wary of anyone who does. What we will do is tell you honestly whether an idea will work, advise you at every step and report on what it delivers.
Where do I start?
Tell us the one problem costing you most right now, whether that's a launch, a listing or a brand that's lost its shape, and we'll tell you which of the five fits.
Talk to us about what you need.
A launch, a listing, a brand that's lost its shape or a voice nobody's hearing yet. Tell us what's costing you most and we'll tell you honestly where we'd start.
Start a conversation now