Virtual Group wins brief to relaunch Country Life butter
The English Butter Marketing Company (EBMC) has handed start-up agency The Virtual Group the 1m account for the relaunch of Country Life butter.
The relaunch, which includes new packaging to appear in September, will see the return of the slogan that ran five years ago: “You’ll never put a better bit of butter on your knife.” This was created by the now defunct agency Geers Gross.
Country Life is the third-biggest butter brand in the UK, after Anchor and Van den Bergh’s Lurpak. The EBMC is an amalgam of St Ivel, Dairy Crest, Express Dairies and the Co-op.
Managing director Dominic Evans says Country Life is relaunching because there is a need to support brands in the butter market. “Butter is one of the few grocery sectors where branded items are still king,” he says.
The Virtual Group pitched against three other agencies for the business. It launched in January with three principals: Dominic Evans, former managing director of poster specialist Premier Outdoor; Simon Carbery, the former head of copy at Lowe Howard-Spink; and Jonathan Butler, the former business director of Sydney agency The Campaign Palace. Evans says: “We expect to provide a major resource for clients and serious competition for conventional, high-overhead consultancies and agencies.”
The group, which works on a project basis, rather than a commission-based retainer, also worked for the National Magazine Company’s The Cosmopolitan Show and The Stilton Cheese Makers’ Association.
