More than 100 media, style influencers, stakeholders and loyalty customers attended ‘Rotunda Premiere’.  Organised by giraffe, the evening was used to launch Rotunda with the first showing of a cool promotional DVD (which was also posted in advance to all TV channels).

The launch was supported with a comprehensive media pack which comprised high quality CGIs, a fun and interesting fact pack and biographies.  A pre-launch release was issued to support the DVD premiere and numerous media briefings were arranged.

Creative feature synopses were produced, along with reader competitions to win a weekend in Urban Splash’s showcase apartment in Manchester. 

giraffe developed a campaign, Iconic Instances, with which to gain publicity for Rotunda and build a sense of excitement and anticipation for the sales day.

Featuring the ‘emerging icons’ identified by giraffe. the events devised by us included an ‘Urban Fusion’ dance evening, an architectural debate and an architectural tour, each of which generated their own publicity and were well attended.

The issue of material was carefully planned, with much of it provided on an exclusive basis in order to generate larger feature pieces, followed by a more universal distribution.  With the primary target being regional coverage, we also revised all regional publicity material to maximise the secondary target of national and trade media.

Without doubt, the biggest result was that all of the apartments were sold within a record-breaking 20 minutes of the sales launch!  Other quantifiables:

• A circulation of 5.43 million, with an AVE equivalent value of £196,586 of print value alone was achieved
• Publicity included 48 features and 48 news pieces in regional titles and web sites, 7 radio news (with several bulletins each day) and 4 TV  feature pieces, including feature pieces in national titles such as The Financial Times, The Sunday Times and the Daily Mail and major profiles in key trade press
• Traffic to urbansplash.co.uk (the main route for enquiries) increased by 40% in the run up up to the sales launch.

Here's what Lisa Ashurst, head of communications for Urban Splash, thought: “The sales launch for Rotunda was incredibly important to Urban Splash; it had to be a success to mark our first entry into the West Midlands. 

There is no doubt that the PR campaign delivered by giraffe played a very significant role in its success, not just in terms of the physical sales delivered - £25m in 20 minutes - but in terms of establishing the reputation of Urban Splash in a brand new region as it business grows from its north west base.”