WCRS picks Saatchi boss for strategy post

WCRS has recruited Saatchi & Saatchi Advertising’s group media director Russell Place as its new communications strategy director.

WCRS has recruited Saatchi & Saatchi Advertising’s group media director Russell Place as its new communications strategy director. He replaces Mark Palmer, who leaves in the next month to join BMP Optimum.

Place, who worked on Toyota at Saatchi, will be responsible for media planning and communications for the BMW and Land Rover accounts.

He has worked for Saatchi for three years on accounts which include Toyota, Bhs and the Central Office of Information. Before that he worked at WCRS for four years on the BMW account.

Place says: “I will look at communications in general, not just traditional media solutions, but I will think outside traditional media planning.”

WCRS’s media buying and planning has been merged with sister media agency Mediapolis, apart from the planning for the BMW and Land Rover accounts. Both companies are owned by French network Havas. Place will head a team of newly recruited planners.

Mark Palmer, who has been at WCRS since 1995, will take up a planning position at BMP Optimum, assuming the responsibilities of Derek Morris, the company’s joint managing director who left in June. Palmer will be deputy to managing director Paul Taylor.

Recommended

Van den Bergh takes axe to Dalesby’s line

Marketing Week

Van den Bergh Foods has dropped its premium-taste spread Dalesby’s less than a year after its launch. The failure comes despite its positioning as a buttery-type product, the fastest growing sector of the yellow fats market. The sector is led by I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter, another Van den Bergh brand. The product’s market […]

Mirror to act a Telewest ‘agent’

Marketing Week

With reference to your article “Mirror Television buys up Telewest cable arm” (MW August 14), Telewest has outsourced its ad sales business to Mirror Television. Mirror Television has not paid Telewest any money for this arrangement but will act as Telewest’s ad sales agent over the next five years, and the revenues will be split […]

EMAP Elan and Metro boost sales

Marketing Week

EMAP’s Metro and Elan titles enjoyed enormous increases in the latest set of circulation figures released last week. Leading men’s title FHM leapt by 178 per cent, teen titles Smash Hits and J17 rose by 90 per cent and 86 per cent respectively, and home-interest title Period Living was up by 56 per cent. Elle […]