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Click on our faces to read more about us!
Rosamund Hitchcock
Director
Rosamund manages the wine and Champagne accounts, dabbles with the beer accounts and gets stuck into the deadly dull company administration.
She has 20 years of wine retail and PR experience both in the UK and South Africa, with companies such as H.Sichel & Sons, Rebel Supermarkets, Majestic Wine Warehouses and M&S Wines.
Her highest point to date was working on the product launch of Haagen Dazs and maximising spin-off from the ‘sexy melting icecream’ advertising campaign! Mmmm...
Rosamund thrives on bringing abstract ideas to life and has a love of the ridiculous!
rosamund@randr.co.uk
Rupert Ponsonby
Director
Rupert is our ideas man, working across all R&R’s accounts. When away from his desk, Rupert may be found on television or radio, hosting dinners or perhaps touring vineyards, breweries or blackcurrant groves.
Before joining the world of PR, Rupert worked in scrap metal for 15 years and was a founder of Starchi & Starchi, a whiter than white shirt laundering and starching company based in London, from which he made the natural transfer into Public Relations in 1988.
Rupert Ponsonby’s guide to Press Release Writing:
“Remove spectacles. Absently ask the surrounding office a few questions. Replace spectacles, look crossly at computer. Remove spectacles and chew absentmindedly on arms. Make several seemingly unrelated phone calls to various people across the country, knowing every recipient intimately. Replace spectacles. Glare at computer. Continue to keep the locomotion of the spectacles at constant rate. Talk out loud to yourself. Now at optimum writing temperature, approach the keyboard with the index finger of each hand outstretched and attack.....” AJ Sharp.
rupert@randr.co.uk
Eleanor Standen
Account Director
Eleanor works on clients across the whole R&R portfolio including wine and beer clients as well as two of our generic campaigns.
Eleanor obtained a BSc in Leisure Management from the University of Manchester, and went on to work on the Beer Naturally Health campaign highlighting the positive issues of Real Ales and Lager for 5 years. She joined R&R in November 2005 after a brief spell of travelling around South America and Africa.
Using her freakishly brilliant organisation skills, Eleanor has happily converted to the alcohol fuelled world of R&R though she maintains the healthier aspects of her life and love for keeping fit!
eleanor@randr.co.uk
Ian Palmer
Senior Account Manager
Ian is our star writer and looks after the PR for some of R&R’s biggest wine and Champagne accounts.
As a holder of a clean BA in Cultural Studies from Staffordshire University, Ian went on to work in the voluntary sector before moving on to R&R. He has since gained over 8 years of experience in Drink PR and snapped up a few wine qualifications en route. He writes many of R&R’s mail outs and dabbles with graphic design.
Ian enjoys the plays of Harold Pinter and the music of Joy Division; it has been suggested these greatly influence his press releases, and design work. Ian has long established a creative den in a corner of the office; into which no one enters without a Peppermint tea shaped present!
Ian is the proud father of a perfectly lovely baby son, Oliver, who shows every sign of taking after his mother – much to everyone’s relief.
ian@randr.co.uk
Maggie Dogruyol
Office Manager
There is something very Zen about the way Maggie manages our office. Whatever the emergency, however last minute the deadline, Maggie’s natural calm maintains the positive ions within R&R whilst massaging the crinkles from our chakras – or however it works. Maggie also manages client coverage with such order that both New and Old World clients are never left without the latest news or gossip.
Formerly a cardiac technician and one-time sequin seamstress for Jimi Hendrix, this mother of three grown daughters is a fountain of knowledge and her culinary expertise is legendary taking in tastes and flavours from the many countries she has visited.
She has a calendar of naked barmen beside her speed dial which might go some way to explain her contented nature.
maggie@randr.co.uk
Natasha Claxton
Account Manager
Tash joined R&R in July 2004 and works across a number of wine and beer clients, as well as doing some work for our generic campaigns.
Having graduated from Surrey Institute of Art and Design with a degree in Fashion Journalism, Tash started work in a small PR company for 9 months before joining R&R.
Tasha is mummy to the very dapperly-dressed Harrison who is now tearing up the R&R office. She works part-time for R&R on Thursdays and Fridays but can usually be reached on mobile email device.
natasha@randr.co.uk
Nicky Hall-Thompson
Account Manager
Nicky is our resident Wine expert. She joined R&R in March 2007 and works across a number of wine and beer clients, as well as doing some work for one of our generic campaigns, and ran the Medoc marathon in 4 hours.
Nicky snapped up a degree in ‘Psychology with French’ from Exeter University, and worked at various Majestic Wines stores for nearly three years. During this time she studied for her wine diploma with the Wine & Spirit Education Trust, which she finished in Summer 2007.
Nicky grew up in Cork where she organised illegal puppy races. She is now mostly on the straight and narrow, living with a doctor in north London. It keeps her healthy.
nicky@randr.co.uk
AJ (Anna Jane) Sharp
Account Manager
AJ joined R&R in January 2007 and has fast become a beer and food guru, working across a number of different beer, restaurant and cool drink clients, and we are fast turning her into a connoisseurial wino too.
AJ graduated with a degree in English Literature from Newcastle University where she ran the university's Ski & Snowboard Club. She started out working for a company running events in the Alps and move on to assist a software company with their PR, which later prompted her R&R role as “techie queen.”
AJ has a fantastically busy life, swimming, playing netball, partying with friends and socialising on behalf of R&R.
annajane@randr.co.uk
Janis Isbitt
Bookkeeper
Janis has been our part time bookkeeper for over ten years. She is responsible for invoicing, client budgeting and keeping us all numerically sane. The team love to listen in awe as another cold caller tries to pull a fast one over our Janis. There's no pulling the wool over her eyes!
Janis has been totting up figures for many years though her speciality subject is wine having previously worked in a merchandising role in the wine department at M&S. As well as keeping R&R in check, Janis also looks after other clients.
If ‘chasing Rupert for his expenses’ was an Olympic sport Janis would be awarded several years worth of gold medals for her efforts.
janis@randr.co.uk
Wink Ogilvie
Account Supremo
Since 2000 Wink has regularly helped R&R on special projects such as hosting press dinners, press trips, tastings and contributing to our generic campaigns. When help is required Wink is never far away...
Wink worked in the travel business for over 15 years and has written two books on the subject. One of her madder adventures included travelling across Africa in a fire engine. Nowadays Wink concentrates on specialist subjects; wine and shoes!
When she is not at R&R with her mad spaniel ‘Haggis’, Wink runs her own shoe label - www.dragonflysilk.com.
wink@randr.co.uk
Carey Barnes
Account Supremo
Carey grew up in South Africa and studied Drama and Cultural History of Western Europe at Cape Town University.
She moved to the UK over 20 years ago to be an Account Manager for Park Avenue Productions.
Since then she has set up her own catering business, which is flourishing in Hampshire. When not slaving over a hot stove, Carey keeps the R&R office in order, lends a hand at events and looks after journalists on press trips. More than qualified to develop yummy recipes for R&R’s clients, sometimes if we are very lucky, she will cook the team lunch! Carey is a Francophile and has a huge love of wine through her catering work.
carey@randr.co.uk
John Murdoch
Computers & Accounts
John is our resident Scot, and was persuaded down to London by a university friend who wanted technical help with his digital marketing agency. From the corner of a west London office John set up APOJ, a successful IT consultancy.
When John is not fixing the computers, helping out Janis or reattaching Natasha's delinquent mobile to the network, he is very happy to help the team and provide poetic musings with any beer and food tastings.
When not at R&R, or cheering on his beloved Scottish Rugby team, John's technical skills are being put to good use in companies throughout London and the South-East.
john@apoj.com
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