Launch Group has worked on integrated pr campaigns with family favourites Butlins  for over seven years, with our greatest hits including the hugely successful Ocean Hotel Launch  and Sushi Menu. 

Butlins of course needs to stay front of mind with the nation’s mums as the holiday choice for families.  So this summer we’ve let mums and dads in on the secret of how to build the perfect sandcastle – because there’s little that tots and toddlers appreciate more! Sand Guru Mark Anderson was enlisted to reveal 5 secret tips and star in a ‘How To’ video for parents. At the same time, Sandcastle ‘Masterclasses’ were held on Butlins Resorts.

Results included 87 pieces of coverage including top blog Easier Travel, GMTV and the Daily Mirror. Not to forget a screening on Butlins TV.

Other current videos we’ve made for Butlins as part of integrated PR campaigns are the fantastic ‘flash mob’ Street Dance and the humorous Toddler Art Prize ‘talking tots’, helping Butlins find the nation’s mini-Mondrians and weeny-Warhols for the first time.

Hi, I’m Holly, a new Account Manager at Launch Group. I’ve just come to the end of my first week and thought I’d share what I’ve been up to as the newest ‘Launcher’…

Monday

Surprisingly, no first day nerves, just a sense of excitement at joining a PR Week ‘Best Place to Work’ accredited agency. The team is very welcoming and I have a day of inductions planned to get me up to speed. It’s nice to be back in Soho too!

Tea Received: 2

Tea Made: 0

Paper Read: Telegraph

Tuesday

Getting to know Launch processes and relieved to find everyone is as media savvy as campaign results show! The Butlins team secures a great hit for their ‘Fine but Fun Wine List’ from top drinks writer Anthony Rose. 

Tea Received: 1

Tea Made: 0

Paper Read: Guardian

Wednesday

Briefed on an upcoming launch event for premium Vodka brand Black Moth. I also get to taste the delicious cocktails which is a bonus! Keep an eye out for Black Moth from July; it is a must have for any Vodka connoisseur.

Tea Received: 1

Tea Made: 0

Paper Read: The Sun

Thursday

Briefed on two more interesting campaigns – The Discovery Channel premiere of James Cracknell’s ‘Toughest Race on Earth’ and Yell.com’s ShopView programme which is revolutionising the way SME businesses promote themselves.

Tea Received: 1

Tea Made: 1 (for me)

Paper Read: Daily Mail

Friday

Talk through the Butlins 75^th birthday project (particularly excited as my childhood ambition was to be a Red Coat!). I fill in my timesheet then it’s off to the Friday afternoon ritual of end of week catch up over some beers and wine. My first week has flown by and I had loved every minute!

Tea Received: 0

Tea Made: 2 (1 x me 1 x Account Director)

Wine: 2

Paper Read: Daily Star

Or should I say “Calling all parents with toddlers!”? I’m sure that there are some tech savvy tots out there who religiously follow our Launch Group blog, but, just in case, I’ll direct this post to a slightly older audience…

So, earlier this week we launched the first ever Butlins Toddler Art Prize – a contemporary art competition for children aged four and under – supported by the lovely people at the Contemporary Art Society. We kicked off the campaign with a series of radio interviews calling for the nation’s toddlers to submit their works of art. All went brilliantly and we had a great response from the dj’s who all agreed that it’s never too early to encourage children to be creative. And with a prize fund totalling £10,000 (£500 in cash for the overall winner!) we think that children across the country will be frantically painting, sculpting and drawing in order to be in with a shot at winning this prestigious award.

And, even better than the cash, the 12 shortlisted toddlers will have their artwork shown at an ‘orange squash and canapés’ exhibition in a gallery in October at the home of contemporary art, East London. Amazing!!! All entry details can be found at the website so log on to find out more.

But before you (or should I say your toddler) puts paint to paper, have a look at our brilliant video above. Who would’ve thought that four year olds could say things like “post-modernist” and “passionate realism of the renaissance”?! Based on that I can’t wait to see the artwork that gets sent in. I reckon we’re going to discover the next Damien Hirst before the year is out. Entries must be in before the 31^st August 2010 so toddlers…GET CREATIVE!

So, the last time that I posted here, I mentioned that we had a VERY exciting project coming up for our client Butlins. At this point I’m hoping that the penny is dropping and your inner voice is starting to exclaim something like: “I saw Butlins in the paper recently…” or “Wow! The new Butlins Hotel? I sooo want to go there!”

Yes. The new Butlins Ocean Hotel with Spa. Is. Now. Open. And it’s officially AMAZING! Singing showers, disco lifts, funky restaurant, no-monsters-under-the-bed guarantee for kids, and even a Snow Cave! British holidays don’t get much better than this and neither do exciting consumer PR projects. So the team at Launch has been working very hard over the past eight months in order to…

- Keep all of the exciting elements of the new Ocean Hotel with Spa OUT of the press so as not to ruin our big launch day which took place in August

- Get all of the exciting elements of the new Ocean Hotel with Spa INTO the press via our big launch day which took place in August

Phew. It’s been a rollercoaster ride, but an absolutely brilliant one. I could literally be here all day telling you about how fantastic it all was but instead I will just give you the key facts:

• More than 70 journalists and parent bloggers attended the event in Bognor Regis
• 272 pieces of coverage to date which includes:
• 56 national newspaper
• 13 national broadcast
• 26 regional broadcast
• 61 regional newspapers
• 111 online

And the coverage is still rolling in. I think the best thing to do is to leave you with a few pictures to show you how amazing Butlins is. And a few bits of coverage to show you how amazing Launch Group is. Even if we do say so ourselves!

So, as the most recent starter at Launch Group I should really still be classed as ‘the newbie’. Pleasantly this isn’t so. In fact, I pretty much felt like I’d been here for years by week two and I mean that in the best possible way. Having worked at various agencies during my PR career I can honestly say that when I joined Launch it was like no other place I’d worked before. From day one I was made to feel like one of the team and was soon drinking in the legendary Lyric on a Friday night with the best of them.

Six months on, despite waiting for people to relax and reveal their true selves – and you’re probably expecting some juicy bitching and gossiping at this point – nobody has turned into a crazy Ab-Fab PR-style monster. I know! Unbelievable, but true. The team here is just that, a true team and it’s fantastic to work with people you can rely on and who all pitch in to get the best for our clients, the agency and each other. At the risk of sounding like a total loser I’m going to stop ‘Launch loving’ at this point – I regularly get told off by my friends for being far too smug about my new job so I’ve had to keep a lid on it recently.

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