GWR: WORLD RECORD FOR TRAVEL ON A SINGLE BATTERY CHARGE

In August 2025, GWR planned to beat the world record for the longest distance travelled on a single charge by a 100% battery-powered train, thereby prominently showcasing their revolutionary charging tech that could eliminate the use of many diesel-powered trains globally.

GWR’s comms team have always believed in the effectiveness of broadcast and once again asked us to help them maximise coverage at a time when the Trump-Putin-Zelensky talks made media cut through for any other story difficult.

With the record-breaking journey taking place throughout the night, our key challenge was to convince a leading breakfast broadcaster to come live from the train.

The specially adapted train pulled into its depot at Reading at 06:28 having travelled 200 miles, 61 more than the previous record set in Germany in 2021. The record had been smashed.

We were delighted to have met GWR’s biggest challenge head-on: we persuaded ITV’s Good Morning Britain to join the train at 3am in Oxford. They broadcast three superb long pieces while onboard from shortly after they came on air at 6am. They relentlessly pushed the story via TikTok and Instagram.

We were on site to manage crews we’d invited from BBC South, BBC Radio Berkshire and the global news agency APTN as well as undertake remote radio interviews via our outside broadcast unit.

BBC1 Six O’clock News, BBC1 South Today (9 separate hits), BBC London, ITV Meridian and GB News all covered the story. Internationally we picked up hits on 56 TV stations in the USA and Canada all from APTN’s package, while their rival Reuters TV also distributed a package worldwide.

UK Radio coverage was also significant: Radio 4’s PM programme, Radio 5 Live, the News on Radio 2, Radio 6, LBC News and Talk Sport, while there was relentless interviews and news reports on BBC local stations on the GWR patch – Berkshire, Oxford, Somerset, Cornwall, Devon, Wales and Hereford & Worcester – together with Greatest Hits Radio in Oxford.