How way the gas man turned PR man!

She is an American icon, a lifestyle guru at the pinnacle of her fame and wealth. He is a former British Gas accountant heading up the UK's second-biggest PR business. And it was to his company that Martha Stewart turned in her biggest crisis. Dramatically accused of insider dealing on Wall Street, Stewart first called in a team of high-powered lawyers - then hired the best image managers she could find.

And so it was that the Geordie, Richard Nichols, Newcastle United fanatic and formerly of British Gas, found himself in New York's vortex of power and money.

Stewart, a cross between Laura Ashley and Nigella Lawson but richer and more famous, faces jail if convicted. She is relying on the skills of Nichols' marketing and communications agency, Incepta, to boost her case in the media.

Nichols is, in his own words, a bean counter. He is a Cambridge economics graduate who went as far as he wished with accountancy at Price Waterhouse and then quit to join the corporate finance department at British Gas.

'Some of the partners described it as brave,' he recalls. 'It was just as BG's boss Cedric Brown became Britain's most hated man because his salary was soaring while jobs were being axed.

'There were real pigs in troughs outside the annual general meetings.'

For Nichols, 38, whose office sports a beaming picture of himself alongside a rather less ecstatic Sir Bobby Robson, the Newcastle manager, the row over Brown was a foretaste of his career at Incepta.

'Less than 20 years ago, the issues being discussed around boardroom tables were about production,' he says. 'Since then there's been a sea change and now it's all about corporate image, brand management, corporate governance. These are the things companies worry most about now.'

Incepta, with 78 offices in 19 countries, owns the worldwide financial public relations firm Citigate, whose clients include Coca-Cola and McDonald's. It also helped organise Concorde's recent farewell tour for British Airways and has provided services to Roman Abramovich in his acquisition of Chelsea football club.

About half of Incepta's £250 million annual turnover is from public relations, while the remainder is largely from direct marketing.

Ironically, for a public relations firm, it ran into a little PR trouble itself recently. A subsidiary, Finex, wrongly stated in its accounts that new Tory leader Michael Howard held £280,000 of shares in it rather than the £40,000 he actually owned.

The false figure would have put Howard in breach of the parliamentary rules on earnings, and, indeed, he apologised for not declaring his stake anyway. 'There was an error in the accounts and I was at a loss to explain it - it's been refiled and corrected but it was very embarrassing,' admits Nichols.

Nichols had been an accountant at Price Waterhouse, where one client was Citigate, which later became Incepta. He was invited to join the company in 1996.

'They said, ''How would you like a proper job?'' which I thought was a bit cheeky. But they were very entrepreneurial and I fancied their chances of becoming a global media group.

'It certainly sounded better than looking at cubic metres of gas all day.'

Nichols, who joined as deputy finance director, took over as chief executive in March 2001 - just as the worst recession in the media sector for 30 years was about to begin.

Though Incepta has had a good run of late, acting for Morrisons in its battle to acquire Safeway and Granada in its merger with Carlton, all PR firms have been badly hit by the stock market downturn. Profits fell nearly 60% to £1.3 million in the six months to August. 'What's the biggest lesson I've learned from this? That I should have sold my shares at 180p and bought them back at 10p, perhaps,' he says ruefully.

It is a thought no doubt shared by the 100 senior staff at the company who own a third of its shares.