Paul Wilmot Communications Opens Nashville Office
Paul Wilmot Communications is branching out.
The New York-based fashion publicity firm has opened a new permanent office — but it isn’t located in Los Angeles, Paris or any of the other big fashion cities. Instead, it’s in Nashville.
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The bustling Southern city is the hometown of Paul Wilmot’s chief executive officer Hampton Carney, who is seeking to extend the company’s services in the fashion, beauty and hospitality sectors to a new community. The office will focus on VIP relations, earned media, digital services, celebrity dressing and events.
“I grew up in Nashville. It’s a city that I know and love,” Carney said. “It has always been my goal to connect the fashion, beauty and lifestyle clients that we serve in New York City to the vibrant culture, hospitality and entertainment for which the ‘Music City’ is known. Along with notable businesses now calling Nashville home, the city is a top destination for luxury tourism, industry innovators and world-class hospitality. Given the strong economic and population growth the city is experiencing, we felt the time was now to expand our services to this market.”
Over the past decade the city has grown exponentially, attracting businesses in a variety of sectors including automotive, tech, health care, manufacturing and entertainment.
Samantha Kain, president of the PR, marketing and social media firm, added: “We’ve seen more and more talent moving away from traditional hubs to cities like Nashville, Austin and Atlanta while a lot of the brands, hotels and developers we’ve worked with over the years are setting up operations and activations in Nashville. With Hampton’s connection to the city, it is a natural progression for the agency to follow.”
Carney and Kain will manage operations, business development and talent procurement while Jenny Cox of Jennifer Cox Public Relations will oversee celebrity dressing and product placement. Cox spent more than a decade at Paul Wilmot prior to launching her own business and will oversee its VIP arm.
The new office is located at 1499 County Hospital Road.
Carney acquired the majority interest in the 25-year-old agency in 2018 from the Omnicom Group of Cos., along with the minority interest held by cofounders Paul Wilmot, Ridgely Brode and Stormy Stokes. He has worked for the company since 1997. The New York office employs 30 people and the Nashville office has two.
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