Today is a good day. There’s three reasons for this – 1. Anchorman 2 has just been announced. 2. it’s sunny. And 3. Let me think… Hmm… Oh! We only went and won TWO awards at the PR Moment awards, The Golden Hedgehogs last night!
PR Moment held their first ever award ceremony, The Golden Hedgehogs, at Villa Park in Birmingham to celebrate great campaigns, agencies and people. Manifest London were there in force with myself, Alex, Saz and Ali all dressed up to the nines to enjoy an evening of food, booze and lots of cheering. After an awesome three course meal, the awards began… All 24 of them. The MC, Andy Crane of Ed the Duck fame worked his way through categories such as Social Media campaign of the year and Best Awareness campaign, presenting worthy winners a hedgehog shaped award.
So what did we walk away with I hear you cry? Only NEW AGENCY OF THE YEAR FOR THE LONDON OFFICE! And to top things off? Our very own Alex Myers picked up the award for communications professional of the year… Can I get a HELL YES?!
We are a happy (and slightly fuzzy) bunch today. So big up to the Manifest team, you rock.
Next up, The Drum and Marketing Week Engage awards. Keep ‘em crossed for us guys.
Today is a good day. There’s three reasons for this – 1. Anchorman 2 has been announced. 2. It’s sunny. And 3. Let me think… Hmm… Oh! We only went and won TWICE at the PR Moment awards, The Golden Hedgehogs last night!
Don’t we scrub up well?
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If you’re going to sell a product, brand or company, you need to know what you’re talking about. Pitching a new exercise bike to a health and fitness journalist without ever having used the product would just end in embarrassment and said journalist won’t take you or your agency seriously ever again. I’m sure we’ve all done it though, blagging and PR come hand in hand don’t they? But who really enjoys those nervous, unsure feelings you get before picking up the phone and selling in a product you have never tested? I don’t. And after that first pitch, after you want to ground to swallow you up, you know it’s time to sort it out.
Lucky for me, Manifest is a firm believer in work experience. Instead of reading a few previous press releases and the ‘About Me’ page on a client’s website, we go the whole hog and actually do the clients job for a day.
So that brings me to the point of this blog. A client of ours, as you may know, is the mischievous scamps that go by the name of BrewDog, an independent Scottish brewery who we worked with to bring you the worlds strongest beer and an IPA laced with Viagra. We sell in stories almost weekly for the craft beer company, anything from the perfect beer for a festival to the 250% growth of the company in a year, so experiencing the BrewDog way was paramount. This is why yesterday saw myself and Sarah fly to sunny Aberdeen to partake in a day of grafting at BrewDog’s brewery in Fraserburgh!
After getting picked up at the airport by co-founder of BrewDog, James Watt in his rocket Audi (much to Sarah’s delight) we arrived at the brewery, based on a huge industrial estate just by the sea. After a tour of the brewery, including the hypnotising bottling machine and the haunting ‘canteen of death’ (don’t ask), we got down to business. Dirty, sweaty business. For the non-beer drinkers out there, a brewery is made up of many different parts to make a beer. There are kettles for fermentation, filtrations systems, arctic freezers, but it all starts with the Mash Tun, a huge steel container which mixes two and a half tonnes of malt-goodness to give their artesianal beers the taste and aroma they’re famous for. Inside Said container is enclosed, tight and has a temperature of up to 60 Fahrenheit - not a place you would like to stay for long. But, this was work experience, so experience it we did. I say we, I actually mean the very brave Sarah Warman. Obviously I would have put myself forward but i’m still healing from a broken collarbone you see…
Anyway. 40 minutes later and this tiny, blonde girl has cleaned out ALL of the malts in the Mash Tun. The pictures will probably describe how she looked after, as no words will do it justice. Franz, the viking like German brewer, was seriously impressed with her effort. Bravo Sarah, bravo.
The rest of the day was spent with the brilliant BrewDog team, teaching us about the different stages of brewing a beer, malts and hops, tasting notes and even a bit on Fraserburgh’s history. We left with bundles of knowledge, stomachs full of beer and a couple of goodies to boot.
But it didn’t end there! We had food to eat and more beer to drink. The scamps don’t just brew awesome beer, they own some top notch bars too and we got to sample the delights. First stop was Musa, a fusion restaurant that James bought two years ago. We were unbelievably lucky in the fact the night before had seen MasterChef winner Tim Anderson cook there, and his menu was still on offer! We feasted on haggis spring rolls, herring and miso, goats cheese ravioli, steak with lobster mash, partridge and honey and even a beer sorbet with tobacco and ginger biscuits. Amazing. Suitably stuffed, we waddled down to BrewDog Aberdeen. The pictures will do it more justice than words, but I have to say – the beer cocktails were unbelievable. Hardcore IPA mixed with rum and ginger beer? Yes please.
We conked out in the hotel after the hardest grafting we have both done in a while, aching all over and stinking of hops. All with a huge grin on our faces.
Thanks to that brilliant day at the brewery, we have returned back to blighty with a new found confidence in pitching BrewDog, and also bundles of respect and even more passion for this young team. The boss better watch out though, Sarah could be well on her way to becoming a master brewer one day.
If you’re going to sell a product, brand or company, you need to know what you’re talking about. Pitching a new exercise bike to a health and fitness journalist without ever having used the product would just end in embarrassment and said journalist won’t take you or your agency seriously ever again. I’m sure we’ve all done it though, blagging and PR come hand in hand don’t they? But who really enjoys those nervous, unsure feelings you get before picking up the phone and selling in a product you have never tested? I don’t. And after that first pitch, after you want to ground to swallow you up, you know it’s time to sort it out.
(Excited for the trip!)
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Innovative electronics retailer SANYO has been a client of Manifest London’s since January and alongside marvelous music competitions and snowboarding spectacles, we have always jumped on exciting opportunities to get the brand showcased. As part of the campaign we’ve conducted a celebrity outreach programme, which has already seen Xacti cameras in the hands of Skins star Nicholas Hoult, Hollywood star Claire Danes and the (gorgeous) TV presenter, George Lamb.
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So when a friend of mine announced he was styling the X Factor finalists for the live show, a little light appeared above my head. Next thing, I was writing a note to Cher Lloyd and sending my friend off with a swanky new camera to give to our favourite contestant. The net evening, an email arrives with an abundance of pictures featuring an ecstatic Cher and her new SANYO camera. Amazing – just a bit of quick thinking and next thing we know, we have some priceless images to share through the Xacti Facebook and Twitter presences we manage.
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I know it’s only a small thing, but it’s the sort of five-minute moment of inspiration on a Friday that makes for a lot of smiles on the Monday morning.
Cher Lloyd is grinning, SANYO was happy and (as massive fans) we loved it too. Win.
Innovative electronics retailer SANYO has been a client of Manifest London’s since January and alongside marvelous music competitions and snowboarding spectacles, we have always jumped on exciting opportunities to get the brand showcased. As part of the campaign we’ve conducted a celebrity outreach programme, which has already seen Xacti cameras in the hands of Skins star Nicholas Hoult, Hollywood star Claire Danes and the (gorgeous) TV presenter, George Lamb.
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Everyone loves a good awards ceremony, don’t they? Especially when you frequent two in one evening… by mistake (we walked into the wrong ceremony at first!). But we can forget about that minor detail, as we were up for an award, so we rock. ‘Best agency with integrated digital expertise’ to be precise.
(Photos taken from Benjamin Ellis)
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So if you didn’t see my head-swelling welcome in the Manifest London news last week… why not? I kid. However, it’s no joke that I am a bit of a smitten kitten with this company. From London to Huddersfield and beer tasting to solar panels, it’s been one hell of a week.
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29th March 2012
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