1284 founder George Oliver has won the CIPR Mark of Excellence for his work on communicating East Midlands innovation and entrepreneurship.

George was shortlisted in the Independent PR Practitioner of the Year category of the Chartered Institute of Public Relations (CIPR) Excellence Awards 2023. 

CIPR Excellence is the industry’s leading awards event. It recognises the work of public relations practitioners and campaigns from around the UK.

1284 was listed for Independent PR Practitioner of the Year alongside seven other agencies. Nominations were received from around the UK.

1284 was runner-up and singled out by judges for the Mark of Excellence for its work on public and private sector campaigns promoting East Midlands innovation and entrepreneurship.

Former Leicester Mercury Editor, George, said: “I’m proud to be recognised by a judging panel of senior industry leaders as 1284 heads towards its third birthday next month. 

“It’s also really pleasing that the panel were so engaged by 1284’s central idea - using comms to encourage small business productivity through use of innovation.”

George added: “It’s been a good year for 1284 - the team grew with the arrival of Amy Orton as Account Director and we’re now looking to work with further small businesses and local authorities.

“We’ve had a busy few months onboarding some really exciting new clients and we are now moving towards recruiting an additional team member.”

Loughborough-based 1284 operates around the East Midlands, working with growing businesses to help effectively communicate their offer at start-up and scale-up stage.

It also works with local authorities including the Leicester and Leicestershire Enterprise Partnership, Rykneld Homes, and several councils and universities.  

1284 services include stakeholder engagement, PR campaigns, media relations, copywriting, ghostwriting, and bid-writing, and more.

Both George and Amy are Chartered public relations practitioners and former journalists.

George said: “It was important to us, upon moving over from careers in regional media, that we retrained to the highest standard in our new industry.

“It was therefore welcome that CIPR judges appreciated the value we placed in gaining Chartered status through our approach to PR leadership, strategy, and ethics.”

CIPR President Steven Shepperson-Smith said: "Everyone shortlisted for awards at this prestigious ceremony reflected the best of the UK PR industry - particularly those who came away as winners."