Fracassini Makes Move into PR

One of the highest-profile casualties during a massive staff cutback at The Sunday Times Scotland has been taken on by one of the country's best-known PR agencies.

Camillo Fracassini, former deputy editor of The Sunday Times Scotland, has been appointed account director at The BIG Partnership.

He joins the Edinburgh office of The BIG Partnership, regarded as the UK’s largest PR consultancy outside of London, and will work with the firm’s corporate team in the capital.

In addition to Fracassini’s appointment, Gayle Nicol joins BIG’s Aberdeen office as a senior account manager from IPB Communications in Manchester, where she spent six years working for public and private sector clients.

Says Alex Barr, director of The BIG Partnership: “These appointments further strengthen the broad range of communications professionals at BIG and will add considerably to the corporate teams in Edinburgh and Aberdeen, where we’re continuing to see strong growth.”

Fracassini was previously deputy editor and news editor of The Sunday Times Scotland, foreign editor at Scotland on Sunday and consumer affairs correspondent at the Scotsman.

In May, allmediascotland reported the Sunday Times' operation in Scotland being reduced from around 16 staff to a handful.

In June, allmediascotland further revealed that the paper's editor, Carlos Alba, was setting up his own communications agency.

In Nicol’s previous role, she advised regeneration and economic development organisations, worked with supermarket giant, Tesco, and devised and managed numerous public planning consultations. Her previous client experience includes the United Nations, Rochdale Development Agency and Visual Planet.