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The SABRE (Superior Achievement in Branding and Reputation) Awards  are “the world’s largest awards competition for the public relations industry, the SABRE Awards celebrate PR campaigns that demonstrate the highest levels of creativity, integrity and effectiveness.”

…its kind of a big deal. And guess what? WE WON!

Edelman won Global Agency of the Year, beating Burson-Marsteller, Fleishman-Hillard, MSL Group, and Weber Shandwick for the competition‘s top honor. Not only this, we also shared the Platinum Award and Social Media Campaign SABRE with Weber Shandwick, both for Pepsi Refresh, which was named the best campaign of the year in any region. Not bad going.

So this is just a little shout out to Edelman. Big thumbs up! I’m very proud to be an integral cog just a tiny part of this amazing, multi-award winning global agency!

So it was to my surprise when, just a few weeks into my Edelman experience, I found myself at Shoreditch House, a swanky members club in central London, with celebrity chef Heston Blumenthal. He was releasing research he had done using Sherry, and the ‘perfect pairings’ it forms with various foods. The venue was packed with journalists from across Europe, all there to learn about Heston’s discoveries, and I was lucky enough to be involved.

Sherry has suffered from the reputation of being a drink that you only sample with your Grandma at Christmas, but Heston showed all attending that this is certainly not the case. We sampled 7 different sherries, each with its perfect food pairing, and I can honestly say that I was converted by the end of the night. I even invested in a bottle.

It was back to the more routine activities at the office the morning after (with a slightly sore head!), but it had been great to gain an insight into the more commonly perceived side of PR, and the amount of hard work it takes behind the scenes to make such an event run so smoothly.

So much for myths.