Challenge
Pagefield was hired by St Bartholomew’s, the UK’s oldest continuously working hospital, in 2019, to develop and deliver a high-impact four-year PR campaign to celebrate the hospital’s 900th anniversary in 2023.
We were tasked with working with a wide range of stakeholders across the Barts ‘family’ (Barts Health, Barts Charity, Barts Heritage and St Bartholomew the Great Church) to understand and raise awareness of all the different areas of the hospital.
Approach
We devised an overarching campaign – ‘Past, Present and Future’ – to tie in and bring to life all aspects of the hospital’s long and colourful history, current operations, and upcoming projects.
We designed and implemented a targeted briefing programme to build awareness of the anniversary among key national media. This involved liaising with numerous members of staff across the trust – including senior management, health professionals, patients, heritage experts, and even archivists – to prepare them for interviews.
Results
Over the course of the period leading up to the official birthday celebration, we secured a range of broadsheet features designed to prompt interest initially in the history of Barts and latterly in the exciting developments on the ground today. This included two substantial pieces in The Daily Telegraph – covering all aspects of the 900th from the history of the hospital to the future of healthcare at Barts – and in The Times, focussing on how the new Breast Cancer Centre would bring the entire treatment process from diagnosis to reconstruction under one roof.
To mark the official 900th birthday itself on the 25th of March 2023, Pagefield secured broadcast coverage with BBC Breakfast, GB News and Good Morning Britain, and further features in The Times, The Daily Telegraph, The Daily Express, The Evening Standard and The Sun.
Overall, this coverage reached over 200 million people globally during the course of the weekend.
“Pagefield’s support in building a national campaign to celebrate our 900th anniversary exceeded all our best expectations. The team delivered on all of their promises: to act like an extension of our own team; to always challenge us on our thinking; and above all to secure the most impactful and appropriate coverage for all aspects of our birthday, which was a historic moment for both the hospital and the UK.”
– Professor Charles Knight OBE, Chief Executive of St Bartholomew’s Hospital
Image of the Great Hall © David Butler
