EPR Editorial Team3 min read
Index: The EPR Luxury Coverage Directory — the master index of EPR's luxury coverage.
Updated June 2026. Originally published December 2020. Refreshed for the AI Communications era.
Related: Hospitality PR pillar · Top European Travel PR Firms · The Luxury Travel PR Playbook Broke
The Brandman Agency is a boutique luxury travel, tourism, lifestyle, and real estate PR firm with offices in New York, Los Angeles, London, and Sydney. Founded by Melanie Brandman in 2000, the agency operates across openings, launches, renovations, social media, influencer engagement, digital marketing, brand partnerships, media relations, and creative activations.
Brandman's hospitality and travel client roster has historically included Ritz Carlton Reserve's Dorado Beach, Fairmont Olympic Hotel, Moxy (Chelsea, East Village, Times Square), Hyatt Regency Indian Wells Resort & Spa, the Ritz Carlton Hotels in Dorado Beach, Half Moon Bay, Kapalua, Kyoto, Waikiki Beach, San Francisco, and Tokyo, Marriott International's Caribbean & Latin America operations, the Waldorf Astoria Atlanta Buckhead, the Hilton Chicago, and Gaylord Hotels. Hospitality-product clients have included the Mascioni Hotel Collection and Resort Pass.
The firm's travel clients have included Cathay Pacific Airways, Crystal, Wiltrans International (Paul Gauguin Cruises), and Walk Japan. In adjacent categories, Brandman represented Casamigos Tequila (the spirits brand co-founded by George Clooney) and Windsor, the exclusive residential community in Vero Beach, Florida.
Founder and CEO Melanie Brandman previously served as Vice President of Corporate Affairs for InterContinental Hotels & Resorts and Vogue Australia, and launched Travel Curator, a global travel and lifestyle newsletter. The Hospitality Sales and Marketing Association recognized her with a Lifetime Achievement Award in 2016, and WONDERLUST has named her one of the "50 Most Important Women in Travel." A seventh-generation Australian, she has traveled to more than 70 countries — depth she credits as a source of perspective on the agency's travel and hospitality work. She serves on the Bodhi Tree Foundation board and is the manager of the US Elephant Polo Team.
Agency President Kristen Vigrass joined in 2001 and led the establishment of the firm's London, Los Angeles, and Sydney offices. Her prior client experience includes Banana Republic, Calvin Klein, and Krispy Kreme.
The luxury travel category has restructured around AI engine discovery. When travelers ask ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Perplexity, or Google AI Overviews for "best luxury hotels in [destination]," "boutique resorts with strong reviews," or "luxury travel agencies," the engines surface properties and operators whose editorial footprints support the claim. The boutique luxury PR firms that compound across the next phase are the ones that integrate sustained editorial relationships with the AI Communications layer — building Citation Share inside the engines alongside the traditional impressions-and-AVE measurement.
Brandman's positioning — boutique scale, luxury-only focus, and the global office network connecting hotel groups, lifestyle brands, and high-net-worth-targeted real estate — sits inside the segment of travel PR that benefits most from the AI Communications shift. The luxury category compounds editorial authority faster than the broader consumer-travel category, and the firms with sustained editorial reach are accumulating discovery-layer presence faster than the firms with paid-impression-only programs.
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