When Evergen Systems came to us with their CityTree product for cleaning urban air pollution, they had no profile, no sales, and nowhere to put their 3×4 metre piece of living street furniture, which requires planning permission.
Thinking outside the box, we approached The Crown Estate, which owns much of the land in prime Central London, about taking a CityTree on trial basis. Crown Estate would cover the cost of securing planning permission in exchange for the publicity benefits they would gain from hosting London’s first ever CityTree. Crown Estate agreed to place the CityTree in a prime location at Piccadilly Circus, ensuring it was seen directly by millions of people.
Our media launch then led to blanket coverage across the London press (Evening Standard, Metro, CityAM), specialist outlets focused on Evergen’s target audiences in environment, design and local government (e.g. Dezeen, Wired, Edie, the Municipal Journal) and online sources such as IFL Science, with 25m Facebook followers, where the article has been shared more than 50,000 times and retweeted by celebrities including Hollywood star, Zooey Deschanel.
This enormous impact was achieved within Evergen’s limited budget of just £5,000, and has led to a massive increase in enquires around the world and prospective sales for this important sustainable innovation.
PLMR’s crisis communications experience is second to none, and includes pre-emptive and reactive work across traditional and social media channels. We work with a range of organisations to offer critical communication support when they are faced with difficult and challenging scenarios.
