As a fashion stylist/editor and a personal stylist to celebrities, I spend a lot of time liaising with fashion PR companies. The relationship between journalists/stylist and PR is very much symbiotic. I have been known to call many a PR contact at unheard hours when styling emergencies crop up. New boutique PR company, Kitch & Honey was recently founded by Charlotte Strodl and Skye Harrison(pictured above right and left respectively).

I interviewed the two on how Kitch & Honey PR came about, the clients, the story behind that hip name (how cool is Kitch & Honey?), their party tricks and all the nuances in between.

1. Hi Skye & Charlie! What is the story behind Kitch & Honey PR?

Hi! So the story of Kitch & Honey. Well we met each other while we were both working at Mission Media in the fashion team. It is where we became the blonde duo of PR, championing old school PR rules of being constantly on the phone, churning out the coverage and making best friends with journalists. In this time that we both launched Oli.co.uk and Astley Clarke jewellery together and worked on celebrity fashion campaign Visa Swap with Lindsay Lohan. Skye then left to join specialist fashion PR agency Snow PR to look after accounts such as PPQ and Olivia Rubin and Charlotte stayed to take over the fashion division where she looked after Jigsaw and The Shop at Bluebird.

We had talked about owning our own agency for years but were too busy with our jobs to even fathom putting it together. One night over a bottle of wine we decided to do it. We started having conversations and talking to small brands who didn’t have PR. In July, Charlotte left Mission Media to set up the company with three clients under her belt, clothing brand Misticon owned by friend Charlotte Dutton, Body London, a modeling agency owned by a girl she went to school with and Bellinski, a swimwear company owned by a friend of a friend.

She rented a desk from a friend in Jermyn Street and was helped by an intern to set everything up. In September, after fashion week was over, Skye left Snow and joined Kitch & Honey full time. We have now got twelve fantastic fashion clients, our own office in Oxford Street equipped with showroom, three staff members and a team puppy, Barley.

2. Great company name by the way! How did you come up with it?

One of our best friends is a fashion editor so we went to her for advice on the company name. There are a lot of PR companies nowadays so we wanted something really unique and original. After brainstorming we realised that the two PR agency names we really liked were named after condiments so we knew we had to throw a condiment into the mix. We also wanted something fashiony in there and we landed on Kitcsh after much thought and deliberation. We decided to put both names together as it seemed like the spirit of the times, think Marina & The Diamond, Florence & The Machine. So we ended up with Kitsch & Honey. We looked at it and Kitsch seemed a little bit obvious. We googled Kitsch and we found that in the Urban Dictionary Kitch without the ‘s’ meant ‘cooler than cool’. So there we had it, Kitch & Honey.

3. Who are your clients and what makes you stand out from other PR companies?

Our clients are:
Charlotte Taylor
Hemyca
Florence B
Elvira Sazesh
Stephen Einhorn
Misticon
Connected Generation
The Trouser Room
Katherine Thomas
Bellinski Bikinis
Body London

We are different from other PR companies because we are taking it back to basics. We believe in old school PR methods where the PR’s are best friends with the journalists and can call them up and chat with as friends as well as for work. We believe in phones over emails, regular showroom appointments throughout the week, regular coffees and catch ups and we always make sure we are on the pulse of what is going on in the media and where our clients fit in. We feel that too many PR agencies rely on emails and are too behind the scenes to really get under the skin of individual journalists. We also strongly believe in hard coverage results over lengthy reports and admin.

4. One random thing from each of your month’s so far?

Charlotte – Natasha Beddingfield telling me I had really nice hair at the LFW Kristian Aadnevik fashion show before running her hand through it and getting her nail caught in a tiny dread-lock at the back of my head. Cringe!

Skye – Picking up my McQueen handbag on the way out to a meeting, then realising that the puppy had crawled inside and fallen asleep in it, not before eating a new business pitch document, who says dogs don’t eat homework!

5. Which designers are you coveting lately?

Charlotte – The Anya Hindmarch is never far from my arm

Skye – The McQueen is handy right now with puppy bowls and blankets – glam uh!?

6. What is your party trick?

Charlotte – Balancing on one foot in a six inch Louboutin whilst downing a glass of champagne

7. Kitch & Honey in five years?

A big agency with a boutique feel. Lots of fabulous fashion clients, an amazing office with a huge showroom and lots of lovely employees

8. Last thing you tweeted?

Welcome to Account Executives Verity (formerly of Warehouse) and Hannah (Formerly of Iroquois) and Intern Lucy (Formerly of Mission)

9. Are you a heels or bag girl?

Charlotte – Heels all the way!!
Skye – Toughy – buy too many of both but to keep the man in my life happy has to be heels!

10. Kitch & Honey in five words?

Coverage is our currency, yes!

Follow Kitch & Honey on Twitter here.

Photo Credit: Skye Harrison and Charlotte Strodl.

Labels: charlotte strodl, Five minutes with..., kitch & honey, skye harrison

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