Rainey Kelly nets 15m Virgin Direct business

Virgin Direct has awarded its 15m ad account to Rainey Kelly Campbell Roalfe with a brief to produce a branding campaign for its portfolio of PEPs, pensions and life insurance products.

Rainey Kelly won the business after pitching against incumbent TBWA GGT Simons Palmer and the new branding campaign is expected to launch next spring. But TBWA retains the business for Virgin One bank.

The appointment of Rainey Kelly was overseen by Steve Taylor, brought in by chief executive of the Virgin Direct group Rowan Gormley to move Virgin Direct away from disparate product advertising and towards a more unified brand.

Taylor appointed Rainey Kelly to conduct a review of the brand in September, and later pitted the agency against TBWA in a strategic and creative pitch.

Taylor says: “This is the culmination of a brand project, I didn’t want a beauty parade. I was looking for a more integrated approach to the advertising, where the components fit together rather than disparate product advertising.” But he says that the 15m budget is a “projected figure”. This year, Virgin Direct has spent 11.5m on advertising and Virgin One has spent 1.6m (ACNielsen-MEAL).