Cause UK: Here for Culture

Cause UK is an award-winning full-service agency that offers high-impact campaigns, using digital, film and traditional PR.

Our clients regularly feature in all the major regional and national news platforms. The combination of trusted news, complemented by film and digital expertise, can help increase awareness, footfall, ticket sales and ultimately, boost your bottom line.

About us

Based in Harrogate, Cause UK has won numerous awards, including Prolific North’s PR Agency of the Year 2021 (& finalists in 2023), and recently were awarded B Corps certification. Cause UK is run by two sisters - Clair and Ann - with over a decades’ experience delivering high-impact marketing and PR campaigns designed to inspire, raise awareness, and engage stakeholders.

Putting Heart into the Arts

We represent a number of arts organisations, including Ilkley Literature Festival, the Northern Aldborough Festival, CrimeFest, North Yorkshire Open Studios and the Crime Writers’ Association (CWA). Hugely creative, we are an Arts Council infrastructure support agency, and are advisor to the Yorkshire Symphony Orchestra and Paradox Orchestra; we have produced our own festivals talks, plays and films, including a major film for Sky Arts, broadcast in December 2023: see the trailer: here.

We’ve produced events with Chris Packham, Steve Backshall, Miriam Margolyes, Brian Blessed, and Ken Loach and even commissioned and produced an original play with the support of Freddie and Edward Fox.

Destination PR

Over the years, we’ve organised dozens of press trips and media launches to promote places, events, and attractions with stories on BBC and ITV news, and splashes in the Telegraph, Sunday Times, Marie Claire, Mail on Sunday, The Sun, National Geographic, Guardian, Financial Times, Daily Mirror, Psychologies magazine, Harper’s Bazaar, Stylist, Women’s Weekly, The Oldie…you name it, we’ve placed a story in it! We’ve engaged with bloggers from as far afield as China and film crews from Japan.

Case Studies

We put the Himalayan Gardens and Sculpture Park near Ripon on ITV Tyne Tees, ITV Calendar and BBC Countryfile. The gardens were featured in the Sunday Express gardening pages and the Sunday Telegraph, as well as part of a four-page feature in Period Living magazine. The Guardian included the gardens in their travel feature on the Yorkshire Dales. Extensive local and regional features included spreads in Yorkshire Living and Yorkshire Life. Newspaper and photo-led stories hit the Yorkshire Post, Northern Echo, Ripon Gazette, and the Harrogate Advertiser. Cause UK also commissioned a film with the Yorkshire Post to showcase the gardens. Online stories ran on thebusinessdesk.com, On Magazine, Kitchen Garden blog and the Yorkshire Times.

Cause UK invited a celebrity patron, Joanna Lumley, who described the gardens as “a slice of heaven” to boost further coverage.

We secured prime time TV with BBC Countryfile, pitching and co-ordinating filming in the gardens for its autumn special, leading to being shortlisted for BBC Countryfile Magazine’s ‘Garden of the Year’ Award. The gardens reported a huge 75% increase in visitor numbers.

Launching a new glass floor at How Stean Gorge visitor attraction, coverage included BBC Look North, MSN, Yahoo, the Press Association, and BBC Radio York. Photography reached the pages of The Guardian, Telegraph, National Geographic, The Sun, the Yorkshire Post and BBC Online.

The client said: “The winter months can be very difficult for an outdoor attraction. The media work by Cause UK created a real buzz. We gained national and regional coverage in both digital and printed press, which resulted in a 50% rise in visitor numbers over the winter, and an impact from which we will no doubt be reaping the rewards for months to come.”

Our most recent campaign included profiling its health and wellbeing offer, and announcing new caves, resulting in organising a press trip for the Guardian: The kids go into the cave like superheroes: a family adventure in North Yorkshire | Yorkshire holidays | The Guardian

Harrogate BID

Cause UK supported the Harrogate Business Improvement District when it first launched, providing high quality editorial and film. Services included media engagement, and integrated marketing services (leaflets, photography, website, and digital film).

We achieved broadcast media for the BID over the UCI Road World Championships, securing interviews with BBC Look North, Stray FM and BBC Radio York. The Cause UK team also designed Harrogate BID marketing campaigns, such as Eat Out for a Tenner and Harrogate Cocktail Month; Cause UK designed and implemented the Dine Out Harrogate website. This initiative has grown into a fixture for Destination Harrogate with an annual Restaurant Week. We produced bespoke short films for social media on the campaigns, including the launch of the Harrogate Gift Card to support its objectives to help increase footfall and revenue for local town centre businesses.

Cultural Tourism: Dickensian Legacy

We told the story of Charles Dickens’ links to Malton, reclaiming this important literary legacy for tourism. Cause UK also hosted a Dickens’ festival with Miriam Margolyes in the market town for a number of years, and secured TV including BBC Songs of Praise, ITN news, and a BBC prime-time special, Christmas in the Country, with Ellie Harrison.

Miriam Margolyes said: “The combination of intelligence, ferocious work ethic, massive creativity and utter loyalty make Cause UK my top choice. Thank you for all you do.”

Literary Love

Each year, we raise awareness of Ilkley Literature Festival across a three-month media campaign. We write and place features in the Yorkshire Post, Telegraph & Argus, Yorkshire Living, etc. and nationally in the Daily Express, The Times, and consumer magazines, such as Country Living magazine. Broadcast includes Gyles Brandreth for ITV Calendar on his love of poetry, tying in Ilkley’s remarkable legacy with poet laureates, including Simon Armitage.

For the festival in October 2023, we achieved 140 pieces of online coverage (excluding print and broadcast) with 1.71m estimated views, across three months. Highlights include a feature in the I newspaper, placing authors on Times Radio, and numerous magazine features, with extensive support from the Yorkshire Post and BBC Radio Leeds.

Erica Morris, Festival director, said: “Thank you so much for doing phenomenal job on the PR once again. The regional press – broadcast and print – definitely helped to keep ticket sales strong across the whole of the sales period. It’s probably been the most consistently strong ticket sales we’ve experienced since I’ve been here. You are creative, tenacious, and brilliant and it’s a joy to work with you.”

Theakston Old Peculier Crime Writing Festival

Cause UK was the PR agency for the festival from 2013 to 2019. We helped position Harrogate as the hottest crime writing festival in the UK; placing features in the pages of national and international press, including iconic magazines such as Harper’s Bazaar. We achieved coverage worth ￡3m at the festival, securing broadcast on Sky News and ITV Calendar, with meaningful features in The Spectator, The Times, The Guardian, Telegraph, The Express, and secured a media partnership with the Mail on Sunday. The Independent hailed Harrogate as wearing the crown for the UK’s bookiest town; the Financial Times picked the festival as one of the best book events, as did Country and Town House magazine.

Coverage included how to write a bestselling crime novel in Marie Claire magazine, an exclusive interview with John Grisham in the Mail on Sunday, a Great Drives travelogue in the Saturday Telegraph with Lee Child.

Blowing the Trumpet for Yorkshire

We handled the storytelling behind the Yorkshire Symphony Orchestra’s reformation, staging a media launch at Harewood House. We produced a beautiful film showing off Harewood House as an incredible visitor attraction.

Part of our work included securing high-profile patron, Alan Bennett, with quotes of support. Our story featured in over 138 pieces of press, not including radio and broadcast, with interviews on BBC Radio 4 Broadcasting House. Highlights included a full-page feature in the Guardian, with print coverage in the Times, Daily Mail, Telegraph, the Independent and others.

Coveragebook put the readership at a staggering 1.72 billion, with 3.35 million estimated coverage views.

The Wesley Centre, Malton

Cause UK supported the Project Lead behind the restoration of this iconic church since the very beginning of the project in 2018. Work including organising and evaluating public surveys for various funding bids. We launched a ‘hearts and minds’ campaign securing the support of a high-profile patron, Selina Scott.

Media work included profiling the unique history of the church, and engaging with target outlets in the Methodist community to garner support. We event managed a series of concerts/talks to trial the idea of it as a new events space with acts including Julian Lloyd Webber, Lesley Garrett, and Miriam Margolyes. The project has been hugely successful, securing over ￡2m funds.

Piano on a Rock

During Covid-19, we were tasked with coming up with an idea to mark Landscapes for Life Week for Nidderdale with the National Association for Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty (now known as National Parks). We worked alongside tourism destination bodies and the National Trust to put a white grand piano on the iconic Brimham Rocks to showcase the beauty of the landscape and the power of nature and the arts to help people through the pandemic.

As all live performances closed, we put the attention on this stunning natural stage. As well as our own film using a drone for social media, we invited the Press Association’s videographer and photographer, resulting in coverage online via MSN, AOL, and Yahoo, achieving coverage as far afield as Australia, as well as photo-led features in The Times, The Guardian, The Telegraph, The I newspaper, and on BBC regional news.

Harewood House Picnic Proms

In the summer of 2021, we managed the PR for the Harewood House Picnic Proms on behalf of Vivo Entertainment, attracting visitors from across the UK to a three-night extravaganza, featuring Alfie Boe, Aled Jones and Sir Willard White.

Cause UK has over a decade of experience promoting large scale events across the district, including the Invictus UK opening concert in Sheffield, a charity concert with Gary Barlow in Doncaster, a major photographic retrospective on Mohammed Ali in Bradford, and many more!

Our marketing services

We script and make films, TV adverts, leaflets, brochures, social media assets, annual reports and accounts and regularly provide copywriting for case studies, social impact reports, websites, and funding bids.

Our evaluation

We use Coveragebook to evaluate the impact of our work, which gives clients a dashboard of metrics. Client testimonials, visitor footfall and economic impact figures also provide useful methods for evaluating impact. We also use the latest PR software, Cision, which provides extensive media monitoring and reports.

Testimonials

We have 26 five-star Google reviews. Find more client testimonials on our website .

Alexandra Balazs, Head of Operations at Prolific North on Cause UK’s win for PR Agency of the Year: “This entry blew the judges away. The judges fed back that Cause UK, which supports the arts, ethical businesses, and social enterprises, doesn’t do things by halves and has done fabulously. They do commendable work and have stood up for what matters.”