Smoking Gun has been appointed by international value hotel group easyHotel to lead its UK consumer communications strategy.
The appointment follows an intensive competitive five-way pitch process and will now see Smoking Gun tasked with a high-impact consumer PR brief designed to raise awareness and consideration for the brand across the UK market.
The account will be led by Sarah Twyman, Smoking Gun’s head of consumer & director of client services, who brings extensive expertise in driving consumer consideration and preference, and brand storytelling.
The win further strengthens Smoking Gun’s already established credentials in the travel, tourism, and leisure sectors, including award-winning activations for Alton Towers Resort, perception change campaigns for Eurocamp, and digital visibility work for Destination2.
Hussain Ul-Haq, PR Manager, at easyHotel, said: “Smoking Gun demonstrated a strong ability to develop standout, consumer‑led PR that reflects our brand’s tone of voice while cutting through a turbulent media landscape. Their approach supported commercial uplift and was backed by a strong track record of working with recognisable consumer and travel brands, cementing them as the right partner to help grow confidence and consideration for easyHotel in the UK.”
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Rick Guttridge, founder and CEO of Smoking Gun, added: “easyHotel offers great value, done properly. Its proposition of ease, comfort and humour gives us a story prime for turning awareness into action. Our digital-first strategy will build brand visibility, memorability, likeability.”
EasyHotel was originally founded by easyJet founder Stelios Haji-Ioannou through his easyGroup of companies and was incorporated in 2004, opening its first hotel in South Kensington, London the following year. It floated on the London Stock Exchange in June 2014, raising £24.5 million to fund further growth and expansion. In August 2019, directors of the company backed a £139 million bid for the company from a consortium made up of Luxembourg-based ICAMAP and Ivanhoé Cambridge of Canada despite opposition from the founder.
Smoking Gun seeks to deliver PR campaigns that achieve measurable business impact, and its methodology has seen the agency win over 100 peer-judged industry awards.
