Emily Harris: how to harness the power of PR for your brand
Media is a powerful storytelling tool – but how can spirits brands utilise the power of PR to grow their businesses? Emily Harris, founder of award-winning May Fox Communications, shares more on the latest episode of The Spirits Business Podcast.
In 2012, Harris founded her award-winning PR agency May Fox Communications. Utilising the skills she had acquired working at both luxury PR agencies and in-house at Moët Hennessy.
One of Harris’s first clients when she set up May Fox was American whiskey Balcones, now owned by Diageo. Today, Harris, along with May Fox senior consultant Ruth Mulcare, continues to work with the wine and spirits arm of Moët Hennessy, which includes brands such as Glenmorangie, Ardbeg, and Hennessy Cognac. The May Fox portfolio also works with renowned glassmaker Glencairn Crystal, and newer, up-and-coming distilleries such as White Peak and Lochlea.
In the latest episode of The Spirits Business Podcast, Harris explains why PR is such a powerful tool to help establish a brand, both within the trade and among consumers.
“If PR is done properly, it should really be the underpinning of a good marketing or brand campaign,” Harris says. “It’s like the glue holding all the pieces together. It’s the advocacy, the people talking about the brand in a positive way, it’s your reputation. It’s the way the brand is built.
“It’s about who supports you and how they’re communicating about your brand, and it’s about what you’re worth and what you stand for.
“Grassroots PR for a new brand is so important. Getting a new product into the hands of the right people, and talking about it, is relatively cost effective. You’re going to pay a fraction of what you do on a big advertising campaign or sponsorship, and that can obviously all come later, hopefully, but [PR] is a way of reaching your target audience.”
Harris also highlights the skills of PRs being able to help newer brands, in particular, formulate the right message and story about their product.
“We’ve had a few instances where clients, or prospective clients, have come to us and said, ‘This is our liquid, and this is this’, and it’s not until they then pass over a piece of information, or detail, and you’re like, ‘Whoa, this is super interesting. This is a whole other story angle.”
PRs often sit in a tricky middle spot, having to manage both client and media expectations – which can often not align, for multiple reasons.
The ability to hold this level of diplomacy is a key skill of good PRs, Harris explains, stressing the importance of building solid professional relationships with journalists and clients.
She shares several pieces of advice for PRs and brand owners/founders in the early stages of their careers on how to do this best throughout the podcast episode.
“Relationships are everything,” Harris stresses. “They are the bread and butter – but they also make those awkward conversations so much easier because you can just be honest, and [the client] knows you’ve got their best interests at heart.”
Changes in supporting working mothers
Harris also touches on the positive changes she has seen in the PR world when it comes to supporting working mothers, and fathers.
She hopes the days of feeling “embarrassed” to go home to put your child to bed are behind us, but also notes there is still room for improvement.
“I think the world is changing and I think it definitely feels different to how it was when I first set up. It feels less embarrassing to say that you’re sneaking off home to put your child to bed.
“I know there’s lots of brilliant movements from individuals, and from organisations making sure that women have a voice and making sure there’s recognition in that respect. I’ve seen lots of positive [things] from the PR side of things, positive happenings around that, and an evolution of that in the last 10/15 years.”
She continues: “There’s a wealth of opportunity but it’s just trying to capture that, and making sure we’re not losing all this amazing talent.”
The full episode with Harris is now available to listen to on all major streaming platforms, including Apple Podcasts, Spotify and Amazon Music. It is also available to listen to for free via the link below and on the Acast website.
Past guests on The Spirits Business Podcast have included Beanie Espey, managing director of The Distillers One of One, who spoke about what it’s like curating one of the world’s rarest whisky auctions. Additional recent episodes have included founders Joyce and Raissa de Haas, the founders of Double Dutch tonics and mixers, Jean-Christophe Coutures, CEO of Stock Spirits Group, and Claire Warner, former head of luxury advocacy at Diageo.
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