Former Unilever marketing director joins Press Box PR to support growth across FMCG, retail, food and hospitality

• Smith brings more than 30 years of commercial and marketing experience with brands including McVitie’s, PG Tips, Lipton, Knorr and Sharwood’s
• Appointment strengthens Press Box PR’s ambitions to expand its retail and FMCG client portfolio

Press Box PR - the award-winning digital PR agency specialising in betting, gaming, sport, e-commerce, retail and hospitality - has appointed experienced FMCG executive Laurence Smith as retail, hospitality and FMCG growth director.

Smith will work with the agency’s leadership team to support its continued expansion across the FMCG, food, retail and hospitality sectors, bringing more than three decades of senior marketing, commercial and business leadership experience.

With offices in London and Manchester, Press Box PR specialises in securing earned media coverage across consumer, trade, sport, finance and technology publications, while also helping brands increase their visibility in AI-generated answers, citations and large language model recommendations. 

Smith has held senior positions with some of the UK’s best-known consumer businesses and brands, beginning his career at RHM before becoming senior brand manager at United Biscuits, where he had responsibility for the £150m McVitie’s Digestives portfolio.

He later spent more than ten years at Unilever Foodsolutions, progressing through a number of senior roles before becoming marketing director for the UK, Ireland and Nordics. During his time with the company, he worked across brands including PG Tips, Lipton, Knorr and Pot Noodle, while overseeing major marketing budgets, category strategies, innovation programmes and international commercial partnerships.

His experience at Unilever included leading a category leadership programme which delivered £4m of incremental revenue in 12 months, as well as developing a global beverage strategy which helped secure major tea contracts with Compass and Sodexo.

Track record of scaling businesses

Following his corporate FMCG career, Smith became global managing director of E-cloth, overseeing the UK, US and international business.

During his tenure, the company expanded from four to more than 30 international markets and secured retail distribution with brands including Sainsbury’s, Tesco, Waitrose, John Lewis, B&Q and Dunelm. The business grew from £2.5m turnover to £25m, while digital developed into a significant new sales channel.

He has also held non-executive and advisory positions with businesses including BAKO Group, Vitality House Ltd. and Record Power, supporting strategic planning, governance, international expansion and profitable growth.

In his new role with Press Box PR, Smith will use that experience to support the agency’s growth strategy, identify opportunities across the FMCG and consumer sectors and provide commercial insight as the business expands its offering to brands operating across retail, food, hospitality and related markets.

Katie Storey, head of e-commerce and director at Press Box PR, said: “Laurence brings an enormous amount of commercial and marketing experience from across the FMCG sector, both with major global businesses and entrepreneurial growth companies.

“He understands first-hand the challenges brands face when trying to grow market share, launch new products, enter new markets and build stronger relationships with customers and consumers.

“As we continue to expand Press Box PR beyond our established sectors, having someone with Laurence’s experience and network working alongside us will be hugely valuable. There is a significant opportunity for us across FMCG, retail, food and hospitality, and Laurence will play an important role in helping us realise it.”

Smith said: “I’ve spent my career focused on growing brands and businesses, whether that has been within multinational organisations such as Unilever or helping smaller companies scale into new channels and international markets.

“What attracted me to Press Box PR is its commercial approach to communications and its understanding that PR needs to contribute to wider business growth.

“There is a strong opportunity to take the expertise the agency has developed in digital PR, earned media and AI visibility into a broader range of consumer and FMCG businesses. I’m looking forward to working with Katie and the team to build those relationships and support the next stage of the agency’s growth.”