Month: June 2002

Perfect packaging

Marketing Week

Packaging innovation comes at a price. Although new designs may increase sales in the short term, fashions are often short-lived. The costs involved in rebuilding production lines may be prohibitive.

Soul triumphs in Drambuie pitch

Marketing Week

Soul has won the advertising for Drambuie Cream Liqueur, beating cdp-travissully and Burkitt DDB in a competitive pitch. The &£1m budget will be concentrated on a print campaign in the three months leading up to Christmas, the product’s key sales period. Drambuie Cream is the cream variant of the original Drambuie Scotch whisky liqueur. It […]

Video Networks prepares to slash marketing department by up to half

Marketing Week

Video-on-demand Video Networks is preparing to lay off up to half its 20-strong marketing department to reduce losses. Last week the company decided to halve its workforce from 626, following a decision to limit customer growth until 2003 in order to control losses. Marketing director Mark Springett says: “All departments in the company are affected […]

Police Mutual marketing post created

Marketing Week

Finance company Police Mutual has appointed Clare Preston to the newly created position of marketing director. Marketing was previously handled by business development manager Mark Charnock. The new position has been created to increase the importance of marketing at the boardroom level. Preston joins from building society Birmingham Midshires – owned by HBOS – where […]

Wella extends Silvikrin range into styling

Marketing Week

German haircare company Wella is to extend its Silvikrin hairspray range into the styling market for the first time in a bid to revive its image. The new range will be launched in August and will comprise ten different styling products. The products are expected to be priced between £2.89 and £3.29, in line with […]

‘I sentence you to 90 minutes…’

Marketing Week

There should be more justice in the world. We beat Germany, we should have beaten Argentina… wait a minute – we did! But the Diary almost had a heart attack when going through the post a couple of days before the game. The last thing most of us want to see is a letter with […]

Lotto sales plummet to a new low

Marketing Week

For the second time in three weeks, sales of the Saturday National Lottery main draw have fallen to a record low. Camelot has blamed the World Cup and the Jubilee double bank holiday for the slump in sales for its main Saturday Lotto game. Sales for the draw on June 8 fell to £42.3m. This […]

Why the grey market is a grey area

Marketing Week

I suspect that all marketers who practise in specialist areas roll their eyes in anticipation of misunderstanding when commentators from outside make forays into the their domain. However, Polly Devaney’s article on the over-50s market made much better observations than most, but with one important exception (MW May 30). Marketers don’t pursue the mature market […]

A bit of artistic Licence from ITV

Marketing Week

“Clutter,” I hear you mutter. Ads are everywhere and consumers are becoming disillusioned. Big brands are getting more and more frustrated at receiving very little return for the millions they splash out every year on advertising. This might be about to change. While digging through some discarded memos in a bin near Granada Television’s offices, […]

Passing the acid test

Marketing Week

When Richard Wheatly first joined Jazz FM as chief executive, the business was worth less than £6m, but under his leadership it went from strength to strength and last week was sold for £44.5m. Lucy Barrett speaks to the man who helped to move

Carling TV ad slammed as ‘offensive’

Marketing Week

Carling’s latest television ad, launched last week during the England versus Sweden World Cup match, is being investigated by the Independent Television Commission (ITC), after a number of viewers complained that it was offensive. The campaign, which was created by Leith London, with media buying by BBJ, features a frustrated woman whose boyfriend refuses to […]