Body Shop hunts marketing chief

The Body Shop is searching for an external candidate for the new post of marketing director. It has temporarily moved chairman Gordon Roddick to the role after restructuring its marketing department.

The new marketing director will have a seat on the company’s main board.

The Body Shop is also intending to appoint up to seven product marketing managers. It has pledged to double its marketing spend this year to 3.5m

(MW May 12).

The shake-up is seen by observers as a sign of the ethically-sound retailer’s

difficulties in forging a coherent marketing strategy. It has in the past decried advertising.

Head of strategic mar keting Jilly Forster has had her job title changed to

head of corporate style, although the company insists she will carry on the work she has been doing since May last year.

“Forster will continue to focus on company values and campaigning issues. The change in her job title reflects this much better,” a spokesman says.

Her work includes co-ordinating relations with agency Chiat/Day, appointed last year to develop strategic marketing initiatives (MW October 14).

It has been suggested that Body Shop is planning to part company with Chiat/ Day, though both parties dismiss this as speculation.

Forster was appointed Body Shop’s head of marketing in May 1994. She was previously head of communications at the company after being recruited from the PR agency she ran, Munroe & Forster.