Challenge
Just as hotel and events business Surgeons Quarter was preparing for an exciting period of growth and development, its fortunes were turned on their head by the pandemic.
The potential ill-effects were particularly profound, since all profits from its hotel, four events venues, high-end café and private gardens support the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh’s charitable aims of advancing surgical standards worldwide.
With a successful PR partnership dating back to 2015, we worked with Surgeons Quarter to assess how to keep its reputation working, while lockdown devastated its sector.
A most crucial aspect was to highlight how its hotel – Ten Hill Place – would be kept open as a place for vital frontline hospital and NHS workers to rest between punishing pandemic shifts.
Working together, we redefined PR objectives around the Covid crisis and focused activity on supporting the business and planning a platform for it to recover post-lockdown.
The agreed strategy was to position the Surgeons Quarters portfolio prominently in the public consciousness to put it on the radar for bookings when the restrictions were over.
Objectives
We knew that Cutting through the noise of both the Covid crisis and news of all of the massive impact on the hospitality industry was going to be a serious challenge.
Over the course of the campaign (March-October 2020), these objectives were set:
- Deliver high quality coverage in Scottish and UK media – at least 30 items – to raise awareness of Ten Hill Place hotel
- Deliver at least ten pieces of business and trade coverage in order to put Surgeons Quarter in front of events and conferences decision makers
- Support the business’s post-lockdown recovery by driving up occupancy levels and events bookings
- Create a buzz on social media around the reopening of Café 1505
- Put pressure in political decision-makers to support the sector
What we did
Surgeons Quarter’s target audiences from tourists to events industry booking agents. The pandemic, meant a new audience was politicians, making decisions on reopening the hospitality industry.
As the hotel prepared to open to NHS key workers, we planned a media campaing, with tailored pitches for national, trade and regional media.
We identified potential milestones – including the 1000th and 2000th room nights booked – and packaged those stories with reviews and “thank your” messages from grateful frontline NHS staff.
Springboarding from that coverage, we planned the media announcement of a £1.8m refurbishments at the hotel – while also showcasing a special post-pandemic “staycation” deal for key workers.
And we prepared a media campaign for the Café 1505 ‘Al Fresco’ reopening in July with an expanded outdoor terrace and new menu.
By horizon-scanning for newsjacking opportunities we also reacted to a new lockdown in October 2020 by showcasing an impassioned letter from Surgeons Quarter to the Scottish Government seeking changes to restrictions earning front page of The Scotsman
Results we delivered
What we did
