PR professionals from Essex and Suffolk have been celebrating a string of successes in the Anglia, Thames and Chiltern regional round of the Chartered Institute of Public Relations’ annual PRide Awards.

Ipswich-based agency Genesis PR picked up two gold awards at the event, held at Homerton College in Cambridge, with golds also going to Big Wave PR, based at Ardleigh, near Colchester, Essex County Council and Essex Police.

Genesis claimed gold in the Outstanding Mid-Sized Public Relations Consultancy and Corporate and Business Communications categories, and silver in the overall Outstanding Public Relations Consultancy category.

The judges of the mid-sized agency award praised Genesis for its commitment to professional development and corporate social responsibility, while in the corporate and business category the agency was recognised for “creative and well thought-out” work for business and financial adviser Grant Thornton.

Genesis director Penny Arbuthnot said: “We’ve enjoyed a successful year to date and so are thrilled to be named the best mid-size PR agency as well as winning the top gong in the Corporate and Business PR category.”

Big Wave PR and Remembrance Travel, the travel arm of the Royal British Legion, won gold in the Consumer Relations Campaign category and silver in the Not For Profit Campaign category for a campaign to promote Treasury-funded tours to Normandy for D Day veterans.

The judges said that the campaign to promote the tours, which have been funded through fines imposed following the Libor interest rate-setting scandal, “demonstrated a fantastic set of media results on a relatively low budget”.

It is the second year running that Big Wave has won the consumer relations category. Founder and managing director Hilary Collins said: “We’re thrilled to have won two awards this year and to have won ‘Best Consumer Campaign’ two years in a row is the icing on the cake.”

Gold in the Not For Profit Campaign category went to Essex County Council for the Essex Weighs In campaign, launched to help tackle the problem of obesity, which the judges described as “sensitively handled and appreciated by its audience”.

In the Public Sector Campaign category, there was gold for Essex Police, jointly with the Essex, Southend and Thurrock safeguarding children boards, for what the judges praised as a “sensitively delivered” campaign to promote awareness of child sexual exploitation.

Essex County Fire and Rescue Service won silver in the same category.