Bolton-based agency Absolute is celebrating 20 years in business with a year of record growth and the launch of its PR and communications arm.
The integrated creative and digital agency saw a 61% increase in turnover in 2019, with a 25% increase in staff numbers to support the additional business.
Despite the last few months meaning a leaner amount of output, the agency is looking to the future and has strengthened its offering with the appointment of Suzi Burns as Head of Communication to develop the agency’s PR offering.
Suzi comes from Manchester based N Brown Group where she headed up the PR team, the seventh most awarded press office in the FTSE, looking after online fashion brands JD Williams, Simply Be and Jacamo. Prior to that she spent eight years working for PR agency, Havas.
Reporting into Managing Director Chris Hodgen, Suzi will be responsible for promoting the agency, as well as adding PR to Absolute’s existing services of brand, campaign and digital.
Suzi said: “I’m really excited about joining Absolute. They’re a fantastic agency producing bold and original work. The chance to add PR to the mix so we can start to offer a truly integrated service is very exciting.”
New wins for Absolute include Redrow, 11 Degrees, St Dalfour, The Pexion Group, York St John University and Leeds Trinity University.
The agency has invested heavily in its Horwich church head office to support the expansion. It is currently extending its reception, meeting room facilities, social and staff areas, expanding a space which already includes an on-site photography and video studio. The works will see the agency increase to just under 10,000 sq ft of creative space.
Absolute MD Chris Hodgen said: “Our performance in 2019 gave us the perfect platform to navigate the Covid-19 pandemic and we are firmly looking to the future. The addition of our core services across PR, comms and digital, combined with our physical expansion will allow us to realise our ambition of building one of the best creative hubs in the north of England.
“After an impressive 2019, packed full of client wins, existing client projects, and the addition of some incredible new talented team members, we’ve used the last few months to reset, finesse our plans for the future, and are slowly but surely getting stuck right into the second half of 2020 with brave, creative and innovative new approaches to briefs.”
Dominic Walker, Marketing Campaign Manager at Redrow, said: “Absolute have been a fantastic agency to collaborate with. We started working with them in October 2018 with a few small projects. They invested so much time in us and we were so impressed with their ideas, output and enthusiasm, they’re now heavily involved in helping to shape our brand story. We’ve lots more planned with them for the second half of the year and into 2021.”
