P N RAO – A legendary 100 years old bespoke fashion brand. P N RAO, the 100-year old legendary and iconic men's suits brand dates back to 1923 in Bangalore's (now Bengaluru) black & white environment when its founder late Shri Pishe Narayan Rao birthed the brand with a small store in the now #1 high street of India - M G Road. P N RAO has withstood the tidal wave of "suits" (or the "so called" suit makers). What sets P N RAO apart from the rest of the suit makers is their legacy, their understanding of the intricacies and nuances of fine suits, the perfection, and above all - striking the right chord with the right customers - SUIT CONNOISSEURS. 100 years later, P N RAO is undoubtedly the first name in men's bespoke wardrobe, which is now re-entering the women wear segment. Brand has 7 stores in Bengaluru and Chennai put together.
P N Rao reached out to Flags PR from an objective of hiring a PR agency only for their centenary year announcement event, but what Flags did is an interesting story!
Flags completely turned around the requirement after multiple strategic deliberations with the brand owners and made it into an yearlong mandate for handling P N Rao centenary year public relations. 100 years is a significant milestone. Not many brands in the country have achieved and we wanted to leverage it to the max to get the due attention and recognition the brand deserves. We also made the brand understand the importance of organic PR and not getting into paid advertorial.
PR working for P N Rao wasn’t easy as the brand had been doing a lot of paid promotion to sell their story to the world. They wanted media to come and cover their lifestyle event and unfortunately media doesn’t operate in that manner. We decided to change the narrative. We decided to give the brand a larger than life outlook by encashing on its legacy. We dig out brand stories which are not heard of!
Bengaluru has never seen this kind of PR for any fashion brand. We don’t say this, others do! There was no Bengaluru publication which didn’t take up the centenary year story. ET, TOI, The Hindu, Indian Express, Deccan Herald are only the very few names that Bengaulureans reckon with but the story got great exposure in all the publications/ portals, far and wide. The brand, which used to give paid advertorials in toplines has probably minimized its ad spends since the time Flags stepped in with a view to organically drive visibility and brand imagery. Brand is getting organic recognition it deserved with the right kind of narrative.
Flags transformed the perception of P N Rao from a typical fashion house , to a holistic corporate business brand. We have created a larger than life outlook for the brand and the brand got its due respect of being a 100 year old legacy brand. We are now associated with them as their long term PR agency and the brand owners swear by our commitment towards their brand. After all, every brand that Flags work with, becomes its own, and this is the kind of passion we work with.
