Mount couple grow their PR ambitions

Three years ago, Village PR & Marketing was launched from the garage of Bay of Plenty couple Tim and Brigette Paton-Tapsell. This week they announced they were expanding into Auckland and executed their first international launch in Sydney - but their focus is on bringing business back to the Bay. Keri Welham reports.

Mount Maunganui-based Village PR & Marketing's expanding client base has inspired a satellite office in Auckland and the emergence of a Sydney strategy to launch local products into Australia.

Co-owner and director of public relations Brigette Paton-Tapsell said the Auckland office would be located on Ponsonby Rd, in the mezzanine of high-profile retailer Evolution Clothing - a client of the agency.

Mrs Paton-Tapsell said more than 50 per cent of the agency's clients were now based in Auckland.

"We are in Auckland every week, so it makes sense to invest in premises and have a presence in such an important market."

Meanwhile, the agency last week ventured across the ditch to launch Te Puna's Grove Avocado Oil in Sydney. Mrs Paton-Tapsell said the agency had done some work with clients in Australia, but the launch, with a celebrity chef and top lifestyle publications, was its first full-scale Sydney event.

Village PR was now planning a launch in Sydney every quarter to satisfy the transtasman demands of its client base.

Meanwhile, the move into Auckland represents a return, of sorts, for Mrs Paton-Tapsell and her husband Tim, agency co-owner and director of marketing.

Mrs Paton-Tapsell said she and her husband moved from Auckland to Maketu 12 years ago for the famed Bay of Plenty lifestyle.

"We are accidental entrepreneurs. We didn't have any big plans - we just wanted to do what we love, which is PR and marketing.

"We did a downshift in our 30s and now seem to have revved up.

"We're back in agency-land, and it's growing."

The couple launched Village from a garage just over three years ago. They had rapidly grown to 11 staff, including contractors, and an impressive list of national and local clients.

Mrs Paton-Tapsell said the move to Auckland was "a necessary evil".

"We don't have any ambitions to go back to Auckland. Our aim is to stay in the Bay and bring clients to the Bay."

The Auckland office will be unmanned. An Auckland-based contractor will use the base for client launches and media preparation.

A consultant from the Bay would use the office on weekly trips to Auckland.

Mrs Paton-Tapsell said Village grew 30 per cent in the past financial year, and she planned for 50 per cent growth in the current year.

"We're absolutely ambitious and we think it's possible."

The agency's marketing function was launched a year ago and already accounts for around 30 per cent of Village's business.