The Wright Stuff

AUCKLAND, Today: Unilever has appointed Wright Comms to handle the PR for its consumer and corporate portfolio, following a competitive pitch. The incumbent was Acumen.

MD Nikki Wright said: “I’ve admired Unilever for many years for their sustainability ethos and vision, which is closely aligned to our own, and it’s a thrill to be working with them on a number of exciting new projects.

“Our brief is to support them with their purpose-led communications across corporate and product.

“We will seek to bring to life the great activity being driven by the Unilever NZ team and establish Unilever’s position as a sustainable business leader in the FMCG and retail sector in NZ.

“Focusing on the fundamentals like communications is helping many Kiwi organisations weather the Covid-19 storms. 

“History has shown repeatedly that organisations that keep communicating and marketing during difficult times come out stronger.

“Covid-19 has hammered the NZ economy, but we’ve been so impressed by the heroic efforts of many Kiwi businesses – small and large – to stay trading.

“The alignment of values and Wright’s sustainability expertise were key reasons we chose the agency.”

“They have been innovative and resourceful, pivoting their offerings to meet the changing needs and opportunities that have arisen during the pandemic. It’s more evidence of Kiwi ingenuity at its best.”

Wright, who founded Wright Communications 14 years ago, says she’s been heartened by the willingness of clients to continue their PR programmes and strategy rollouts.

“Many of our clients have a compelling sustainability story to tell externally to their stakeholders as well as internally, and those stories have even more resonance in this new, uncertain environment, where greater responsibility around resources will be increasingly important.”

Wright says her company has weathered the pandemic well, with no job losses and just a few clients having to curtail their PR activities, while the team has also picked up a number of new clients.

Unilever NZ MD Nick Bangs says the alignment of values between the two parties and Wright Comm’s sustainability expertise were key reasons the agency was chosen.

“We felt those qualities would be vital to our focus on plastics and climate change in the environmental space, and resilience in the social area,” he said.

“Wright has weathered the pandemic well, with no job losses, while the team has also picked up new clients.”

Wright says the agency’s consumer team has enjoyed success over the last few months in picking up a number of new clients.

“We’ve welcomed in Hunter Gatherer Gourmet who are thriving on the current Covid-driven craze for home-baking, Adrenalin Forest who are promoting their adventure tourism offerings in NZ to Kiwis, Elastoplast, and Glad who have a great health-based campaign happening.

“But our corporate team has also been flat-out with new work in the sustainability reporting area for Synlait, AA Insurance, and Foodstuffs NZ, as well as issues management work for clients of our client Delta Insurance, workshops for Genesis, and projects for Talegenet, Toitu and Envirocare.

“And it was really pleasing to welcome project management and QS consultancy Kwanto back into the fold after some years.”

Wright attributes the swell of new business to that “time-proven” need to keep marketing through hard times.

“PR is an important pathway to capturing attention and brings both credibility and cost-effectiveness.

“But there’s also a strong will out there to be telling those important sustainability stories clearly and well, which is where skilled communications support is invaluable.”

DDB
Unilever’s creative agency is DDB.

AoY 2020
Wright Comms was named PR Agency of the Year by the Prinz earlier this year.