Brand & Marketing Director

About the Client

The employer is a widely recognised UK hospitality and leisure business with a nationwide network of experience-led venues that attract millions of visits every year. It is a brand with strong awareness, real emotional connection, and an offering that stays memorable long after customers leave.

The Opportunity

This is a senior leadership position for someone who wants to work deeply within a brand, not manage it from a distance. You will spend time in locations, experience the product as customers do, and translate those insights into bold ideas that help many more people discover the brand.

Your remit will be to connect customer expectations, business capabilities and cultural shifts, then turn that into marketing that drives demand and gets people talking. If you prefer brands that play it safe, this role is probably not for you.

Role Scope

As a senior leader, you will have a genuine voice in executive discussions across brand, customer, product, trading and growth. The leadership team will look for clear, well-formed recommendations and a confident point of view.

You will influence much more than communications alone. You will bring the brand and customer perspective into proposition, product and experience decisions, helping shape naming, messaging, launch plans and the customer journey itself.

You will act as the senior guardian of a distinctive and trusted brand, defining how it appears across every touchpoint while protecting what makes it valued and pushing it forward.

You will move the business beyond only seasonal campaigns into a continuous marketing rhythm, strengthening an in-house creative capability across social, user-generated content, video, photography and PR.

You will own organic social, earned reach, influencer activity, PR and partnerships, using a strong sense of culture to identify the creators, moments and collaborations most likely to resonate.

You will lead paid strategy in partnership with internal specialists and selected external partners, working closely with the Customer & Sales Director and data teams so paid activity supports commercial results.

You will also use brand, content and channel activity to support wider revenue streams such as merchandise, gifting, events, B2B and corporate business.

In addition, you will lead and develop a 12-person Brand & Marketing team, building a culture that combines speed, creativity, accountability and commercial understanding.

What Success Looks Like

Within 3 months, you will have established trust with executive and location leaders, spent meaningful time experiencing the product, identified the biggest opportunities, and put a practical plan in place for the next trading cycle.

By 6 months, the brand, content and marketing engine should feel more joined up, creative standards should be stronger, and the link between brand activity, demand and trading outcomes should be healthier.

By 12 months, the Brand & Marketing function should be more distinctive, modern and commercially effective, with stronger relevance for growth audiences and a 2027 plan built on brand, product, customer insight and operational delivery working together.

About You

You are a seasoned consumer brand marketing leader with energy, ambition and a willingness to take on a challenge. You know how to build momentum for a brand, make content people want to watch and share, grow both earned and paid demand, and connect creative output to commercial performance. You may already be a Brand & Marketing Director, or you may be a high-performing Head of Brand or Head of Marketing ready for a broader director-level remit.

Most importantly, you want to work on a brand you can invest your energy in and feel proud of.

Essential Experience

• Senior brand marketing leadership experience within a consumer-facing organisation
• A strong background in always-on marketing, campaign development, creative direction and content
• Proven experience leading, or strongly shaping, organic social, PR, influencer activity, partnerships and earned media
• A sharp understanding of the audiences, platforms and cultural moments that help modern consumer brands succeed
• Working knowledge of paid acquisition, performance marketing, digital channels, CRM, e-commerce and SEO/GEO, even if you have not personally owned every channel
• Experience managing internal teams and external partners without becoming reliant on them
• Solid commercial judgement and the confidence to challenge constructively across different functions
• Excellent written, verbal and visual judgement

Helpful Background

Experience in experience-led or lifestyle-oriented consumer brands would be advantageous, including leisure, hospitality, travel, entertainment, sport, active lifestyle, retail, subscription or similar sectors. Multi-site or location-led experience, seasonal trading, merchandise, branded environments or other physical customer touchpoints would also be valuable. Exposure to B2B, groups or corporate alongside B2C would be useful.

Personal Attributes

You should be bold, creative and commercially grounded, with enough energy to lift the room. You need to be a genuine people leader, confident enough to challenge Operations, Customer & Sales and Trading without creating unnecessary friction. A customer-first mindset, brand sensitivity and comfort moving between high-level brand strategy and the detail of merchandise, signage or campaign copy are all important.

You should also be pragmatic, hands-on and non-corporate. This is a role for someone who enjoys challenge, is comfortable outside their comfort zone and would rather be in the middle of the business than observing from the sidelines. Spending time with teams and customers on site should feel natural.

Why This Role Stands Out

This is a rare opportunity to lead the brand and marketing agenda for a much-loved British brand at a point where it is ready to be more ambitious, while still offering real flexibility. The role is remote, with regular travel across the UK to visit locations, so your time will be spent where it matters most: with customers, with the team and in the product. You will influence how millions of people discover and remember the experience, and you will play a central part in the business’s next phase of growth.

Package

The compensation is a competitive six-figure package, including a performance bonus. A long-term incentive plan is scheduled to launch in January 2027.

Equal Opportunities and Recruitment Note

The employer is committed to equal opportunities and to building a diverse, inclusive workplace. Applications are encouraged from all qualified candidates regardless of age, disability, gender identity, marital or civil partner status, pregnancy or maternity, race, colour, nationality, ethnic or national origin, religion or belief, sex or sexual orientation. The recruitment process is intended to be fair and accessible for everyone, and candidates from all backgrounds and experiences are encouraged to apply.

Because of the number of applications expected, individual replies may not be possible. If you do not hear back within two weeks of applying, you should assume that your application has not been successful on this occasion. The employer thanks all applicants for their time and effort and wishes them well in their job search.