Kirsty Leighton is a PR professional on a mission – to create a new form of PR. Her vision is to create an agency shaped by values, owned by the people who work there and bought into by clients with purpose. Her drive, passion and commitment have created Milk & Honey – a PR agency that meets global demand for new and better ways of doing business.
THE INCEPTION OF MILK & HONEY
Milk & Honey was founded in London in 2017 with a workforce of one – its CEO, Kirsty Leighton. Her aim has been to create the kind of agency that people really want to work for. After 25 years in PR and comms, Kirsty has worked with the very best people in some of the best cultures — and some that were not. She’s learnt from both in equal measure.
The primary lesson has been that, if you give people the opportunity to be happy in their work, they will always surprise you. Yet, employee happiness rarely, if ever, features on a company’s list of strategic priorities.
Milk & Honey was to be – and is – a place where people can express their talents freely, learn and grow as professionals, and have the time and support to create truly game-changing campaigns for clients. Milk & Honey is a land of opportunity (hence the name).
In six years, Milk & Honey has grown into a team-owned, fifty-strong, values-led and B Corp Best for the World PR agency. Its global outlook has seen expansion into North America in 2021 and Germany in 2022 – exporting the unique Milk & Honey model to new markets.
The business has grown organically every year since it was founded, in terms of headcount, client list and revenue. In 2022, for example, Milk & Honey saw 14 people join team alongside 44 new clients; give 260 hours to volunteer activities; team members spoke at a host of educational events – including at the UK parliament; and was named in the Financial Times’ FT1000 as one of the fastest growing companies in Europe (something they have achieved again in 2023). Inspiration flows from a single but powerful idea: to connect purpose-led businesses with purpose-driven audiences – and realise the power of change.
VISION, AIMS AND IDEALS
Milk & Honey created its values – of energy, bravery, respect, passion, collaboration and loyalty – long before the first employee stepped through the door. It means that people understand the company they work for, what they do, how they work with each other – and the ways that they deliver for their clients. Values ensure that people come first in a culture where happiness, wellbeing and mental health are valued as highly as profit.
The agency pioneers a new form of business: one that understands that wellbeing, ethics and sustainability are not barriers, nor tangential, to competitiveness and profitability — but fundamental. The company is a B-Corp pioneer, named as B-Corp Best for the World and, with 154.2 points, currently the highest scoring B-Corp PR agency in the world.
Milk & Honey is committed to connecting, to its communities: it starts by helping its people and clients to flourish and grow; then reaches out within its neighbourhood, working to amplify the impact of local organisations and make a real difference; and finally it looks globally, adhering to initiatives such as the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals to ensure that the agency leaves the planet in a better place than it found it.
It’s an approach that means benchmarks are different: staff satisfaction is as important as placements on PR power lists. Products evolve: with new offerings to help organisations discover a better purpose. People grow: learning, sharing and being better.
Milk & Honey is proud and loud – believing that where the agency leads, others will follow. The company strives to be a business benchmark for the environment, social good, sustainability, and diversity and inclusion. Milk & Honey aims to prove every day, with every colleague, client and campaign, that ‘good’ business is good business – building a bigger, ever-more profitable and always ethically-led agency. It believes that, in the future, all businesses will need to work this way.
PRIORITISING INNOVATION AND CREATIVITY
Innovation, creativity and diversity are the heart of Milk & Honey’s client offering. It deliberately employ a range of personalities, identified by a system that assigns a colour to everyone who works here. It means the agency encompasses the full spectrum of traits – from assertive reds to thoughtful greens, and from realistic blues through to positive yellows. As an agency they, it:
- Has a negative gender pay gap (in favour of women)
- No ethnicity pay gap across the group
- Has a 100% female board in the UK and at Group level
- Sees 10% identifying as LGBTQ+
- Sees 38% identifying as non-white
- Has 18% with a disability
- Employs people with or without a degree
Now, every client challenge and campaign opportunity is informed by a huge diversity of thought, professional skill and life experience.
Milk & Honey harnesses this by bringing its people together in agency-wide ideation sessions, such as the weekly ‘Think Tank’ series. It means that creative talent isn’t limited to the account team, but harnesses completely fresh perspectives. Importantly, everyone – from the most junior member to the most senior – is given free rein to speak their minds and let their imaginations run free.
Creativity and innovation permeate the agency’s client work – from nurturing brand reputations to providing strategic advice: from powerful copywriting to impactful web and SEO experiences; and from digital marketing to lead generation.
It pays off with an award win for every client that has worked with the agency for over a year, and some incredible, needle-shifting campaigns:
- An annual global survey from a world-leading technology company that took a different route to sustainability: capturing more than 25,000 people’s attitudes to the climate emergency, and challenging widely held perceptions to drive root and branch change. It was a campaign that captured the media’s imagination and resulted in top-tier global coverage to highlight the client’s ongoing sustainability impact.
- A low budget campaign that got creative to drive results – looking at Black Friday deals to help consumers find the real bargains and avoid the scams. Speaking directly to consumer experiences, it generated huge pickup in target media and set a new benchmark for Black Friday coverage – delivering huge bang for very little buck.
- Innovative thinking that has given the world a new name for an emerging dating trend – “groundhogging” – that saw viral media pick up across the world, culminating with a feature on the top rated ‘The Drew Barrymore Show’ in the US.
- A campaign for a major charity that based its approach on the understanding that people are more likely to donate if they can see how their money improves lives. Regional and national media strategies focused on how donations have a real impact on real lives, and resulted in both widespread and targeted exposure. The campaign was such a success that it exceeded its fundraising target by such a margin that it helped an additional 100 serious children to realise their dreams.
Milk & Honey has also made significant investments in creative resources. For example: the agency recently created the post of Global Head of Media, supported by incredible digital talent; secured media expertise fostered in global outlets such as Al Jazeera, the BBC, CNN and Reuters to truly understand the modern media environment and focused on high quality content to ensure that clients’ messages really land with their target audiences. These investments bring clients the most effective web properties, impactful social presences, attention grabbing video and audience-influencing content.
HONOURABLE AWARDS AND ACCREDITATIONS
Milk & Honey has been recognised for its work in PR -to, date it has received over 100 awards, , including:
- FT 1,000: Europe’s Fastest Growing Companies – 2022 and 2023
- Provoke EMEA Agency of the Year: Technology Consultancy – Finalist 2023
- Real Leaders Top 300 Impact Companies – 2023
- 25 Best PR Agencies in London – 2023
- PRCA Workplace Champions – Winner 2022, and Finalist 2023
- PRCA Dare Grand Prix: Large Consultancy – Winner 2022
- PRCA Workplace Champions: Medium Agency – Winner 2022
- PRCA Dare Awards (SE): Culture and Community – Winner 2022
- PRCA Dare Awards (SE): Media Relations – Winner 2022
- Investors in People Award – 2021
- PRCA 30 Under 30 – 5 x Winners
A SUSTAINABLE AND PRODUCTIVE WORK CULTURE
Milk & Honey’s values ensure that people come first in a culture where they feel they belong. The agency protects the person, while supporting the professional.
The agency knows that long hours can be a problem in PR, so ensure that everyone has a maximum of five accounts to give them the space to think and deliver the best results for clients. It also recognises that, sometimes, campaigns will mean working beyond 9 to 5 – but always records these instances. To ensure that ‘sometimes’doesn’t become ‘always’, workloads are changed to ensure a meaningful work/life balance and time off in lieu is given to recognise extra effort.
Milk & Honey’s wellbeing and mental health offering is multi-layered. It has trained a team of ‘mental health first aiders’ who help to identify and support people who may be struggling, and also to help managers deal with issues positively and sympathetically. Beyond this, a free healthcare package gives staff access to a video doctor and other resources on demand.
People are encouraged to work where they are most productive. Currently, Milk & Honey has teammates spread across the UK and as far afield as Paris. Milk and Honey’s London-based people follow a hybrid model, which allows them to work from home when it’s best for them, but also retains their dynamic, creative and supportive office culture.
The agency always tries to think differently and constantly asks itself how it can improve its offering. In 2021 the company took this approach to the next level by giving the company to the people who have built it – its employees.
Today, 55pc of company shares sit within an Employee Ownership Trust (EOT). With more than half of the team now co-owners of the business, the company generates a greater sense of belonging – with membership of the EOT conferred automatically after 12 months of service. As shareholders, EOT members also receive dividends so that they directly profit from their efforts over the preceding year. The EOT Council means that people input on strategic decision making, with one EOT member elected as a Director to sit on the Trustee Board to fully represent staff views.
Milk & Honey is a proud International Living Wage employer – recently certifying the North American office as well as the UK – reflecting commitment to fair wages and a better quality of life for employees.
A DISTINCT APPROACH
Milk & Honey nurtures reputations by pioneering the idea that ‘good’ business is good business. To put it another way, as audiences become increasingly aware of the impacts that companies have on their environments, they will naturally migrate to those that share their vision for a better world. The agency helps to identify, demonstrate and amplify its clients’ commitments to people-focused, purpose-driven and planet-conscious operations.
Milk & Honey understands both the power and responsibilities of PR. The company is not here to greenwash, exaggerate or excuse. Clients and suppliers must also demonstrate the same commitment to agency values. Milk & Honey can walk away from any client that fails to do so, irrespective of budget. Indeed, the agency ensures that no single client is too big to resign should missions not align – and has done so on several occasions.
It’s an approach that leads to true and trusted partnerships between Milk & Honey and its clients – where guidance is impartial, valued and respected – and they work together to create truly transformative campaigns. This can mean that campaigns influence a client’s long-term business strategy as much as they influence audiences’ behaviours.
STRIVING IN SUCH FIERCE COMPETITION
The challenge for any fast growing company is to stay true to its founding principles: values can often be the first casualty of a growth strategy. Milk & Honey, however, is determined to nurture the idea that inspired its creation.
Milk & Honey, is focusing on the organic growth of its global teams and entering new regions to bring its unique offering: impact-led storytelling for businesses making a difference in the world. The agency’s London, Munich and New York offices are all growing to meet demand for the Milk & Honey model.
Milk & Honey continues to invest in the diversity of its own workforce and that of the wider PR industry. The ‘250 to 2025’ initiative reaches out to diverse candidates to both promote, and breakdown barriers to, careers in PR. Partnership with The Brixton Finishing School sees its people act as mentors to others who might not see PR as a natural career choice, while the ‘Untick the Box’ podcast acts as a platform for diverse voices.
The agency will work with more innovative companies that are inspired by the idea of providing meaningful solutions to problems that change people’s lives. In 2023, Milk & Honey has clients focused on:
- improving the lives of elderly people and those who care for them;
- fashion and lifestyle brands that genuinely believe that beauty is more than skin deep;
- responsible chocolate production that protects fragile ecosystems and supports small farmers to deliver products more ethically and sustainably;
- rewilding projects that safeguard important and threatened ecosystems;
- fintech technologies that disrupt and democratise finance;
- cutting edge genomic data platforms that will transform healthcare for millions of people around the world;
- and a host of other companies that demonstrate how purpose brings profit.
Milk & Honey will welcome more people into their Employee Ownership Trust – proving that employee happiness, diversity and personal growth are essential to the success of all modern businesses.
The agency will partner with more charities – helping them to tell their stories ever-more effectively, to reach bigger audiences and to make a real impact for those they support. In 2023, for example, Milk & Honey has established the pro bono Purpose Academy that works with six small but important charities to embed world class PR skills.
Milk & Honey is reducing its environmental impact. As of March 2023 the company has planted a forest of over 11,000 trees in partnership with Ecologi, to remove over 800 tonnes of CO2. Working with rePurpose, it has removed more plastic from the environment than it uses. By 2030 agency aims to be water positive. The agency will not work with organisations that harm people or the planet - and the Board monitors high carbon clients, which has enabled the company to maintain a 0% high carbon client portfolio to date.
