Bullimore retires from Mars role

Simon Bullimore, UK vice-president of Mars Confectionery and twice president of the Incorporated Society of British Advertisers (ISBA), is retiring from his post at Mars. It is not known whether he will take up another full-time post.

He has worked at Mars for 13 years, the past seven of which were as UK vice-president. His replacement will be Bill Ronald, currently Mars’ UK sales director, who takes over in mid March.

Bullimore is a well-known figure in the marketing world, although he never actually held a marketing position at Mars. He was president of ISBA between 1994 and 1996. He took up the post again last summer, following the resignation of his successor Ian Ramsay, chairman and managing director of food giant CPC, who moved to Brussels.

In this role, Bullimore has most recently campaigned for BBC1 to take three minutes of public service advertising per hour during peak times. He argued at ISBA’s annual policy conference last week that this would enable low income groups to have TV licences.

He is also on the panel of selectors for Millennium Products.