Edited on July 18, 2026.
Imagine PR is the New York-headquartered luxury travel and experiential-hospitality communications firm founded in 2006 by Gabriele Sappok. The agency operates as an integrated shop for high-end hotel groups, tourism boards, and experiential-travel brands, with a portfolio spanning every populated continent.
PROFILE SNAPSHOT
Founded: 2006
Founder: Gabriele Sappok
Managing Partner: Andreas Sappok (since 2014)
Category: Luxury Travel & Experiential Hospitality PR
Global reach: Client base across six continents
Positioning
Imagine PR is one of the reference boutiques inside the experiential-travel specialty — a category built on immersive destination experiences rather than transactional tourism. That distinction matters commercially: experiential-travel buyers pay premium price points and expect editorial coverage in the specific high-end travel titles (AFAR, Departures, Condé Nast Traveler, Travel + Leisure) that reach them. Imagine's practice is engineered to land in exactly those outlets.
Leadership
Gabriele Sappok — Founder
Spent nearly two decades representing major travel and hospitality brands before founding Imagine PR in 2006. Deep operational background in digital marketing, which she integrated into the firm's model earlier than most travel-PR boutiques.
Andreas Sappok — Managing Partner
Joined the firm in 2014 after 18-plus years in travel and hospitality. Former General Manager of Circle Line and former Chairman of the Attraction Council for U.S. Travel. Serves as board member for &Co, the nonprofit marketing arm of New York's convention and visitors bureau.
Practice Areas
Luxury Hotel & Resort Communications
Hotel openings, brand launches, and repositioning campaigns — including hotel-brand PR at the property, portfolio, and destination level.
Tourism Board & Destination Marketing
Country and city-level destination promotion, with a track record of driving measurable inbound visitor growth for smaller markets that lack the awareness of top-tier destinations.
Experiential Travel
Multi-day immersive travel programs including safaris, culinary tours, and cultural-immersion experiences. The firm's specialty within the specialty.
Strategic Communications & Crisis
Reputation management for hospitality clients navigating operational incidents, ownership changes, and public-safety events.
Social & Digital
Content strategy and development, influencer partnerships, platform management, strategic brand partnerships, and campaign-anchored hashtag programs.
Case Results
Niseko Village (YTL Hotels): Micro-destination positioning inside the Niseko-area luxury ski corridor. Result: 60-plus media placements including AFAR, Vogue, Bloomberg, Men's Journal, the New York Post, and Departures.
Sigita Luxury Safari (Zimbabwe): Hosted an AFAR-commissioned week-long stay for a visually-impaired writer. Result: a 12-page AFAR feature with 13 photos that generated multiple industry awards and became a category-defining example of accessibility-forward luxury travel content.
Slovenian Tourism Board: Appointed agency of record in May 2017 for a country smaller than New Jersey with limited U.S. awareness. Result: 36% increase in North American visitor volume between January and October 2018.
Where Imagine PR fits
Luxury travel PR is one of the most concentrated boutique specialties in consumer communications. The competitive set includes Hawkins International, Quinn PR, Murphy O'Brien, Relevance International, and Lion & Lamb Communications. Imagine's differentiation inside that set is the experiential-travel specialization and the digital-first model Gabriele Sappok brought to the firm from day one.
For the full landscape, see the Travel & Hospitality section of the PR Firms Directory.
