Yorkshire-based PFF Group is one of the UK’s largest independent food packaging manufacturers, supplying packaging products to supermarkets and food manufacturers across the country.
A family business, PFF’s headquarters are in Keighley and it has sites in Washington, Tyne and Wear, and Sedgefield, County Durham, employing more than 150 staff in total.
Cicada provides PR and communications support to the company, working alongside its in-house marketing manager.
Our brief is to raise the profile of the business to its target audiences. We are achieving this through a range of tactics to support PFF’s core principles of innovation, sustainability and creativity. At the centre of these tactics is proactive media relations, where we research, draft and distribute press releases to target media followed by the monitoring and compiling of coverage.
An outstanding example of success in this area was our media relations activity around PFF’s diversification into the healthcare sector during the Covid-19 pandemic. The Group won a contract with the Department for Health and Social Care to produce millions of disposable aprons for use by frontline health and social care staff.
PFF invested £2m and created 100 jobs to deliver the contract. This news story – and the subsequent launch of a new health division – achieved coverage across many of PFF’s target media including the Yorkshire Post, Newcastle Journal, Newcastle Evening Chronicle, Packaging News, British Plastics and Rubber, Packaging Scotland as well as BusinessDesk, Insider, Business Link and other online business sites.
This and other coverage achieved across 2021 delivered an ROI of 1:13 – for every £1 spent by PFF, we generated £13 of media coverage.
In addition to media relations, we also seek comment opportunities for PFF’s senior leadership team across issues pertinent to their sector including use of plastics, recycling and sustainability.
The recent introduction of the Plastic Packaging Tax by the Government enabled us to secure high profile comment from PFF in trade titles including Innovations Food and Packaging News. PFF’s MD has also taken part in interviews about manufacturing on BBC Radio 4 and BBC Leeds.
We have also secured exposure for PFF through participation in business round tables, profiling and the drafting of award entries. The company has won prestigious accolades including Family Business Director of the Year (Institute of Directors Yorkshire and North East) and Finance Director of the Year, Innovation (Northern Finance Director Awards).
Our PR strategy for PFF has been a resounding success, raising its profile as a leading employer in the North of England and a trailblazer in the plastics packaging industry.
Sue Howard, marketing manager, PFF Group said: “Cicada is a talented, highly experienced team of truly focused professionals who have generated a vast amount of coverage for PFF Group. I can thoroughly recommend the team as a quality agency who you would enjoy working with.”
