H-F UK picks its first head of marketing

Hachette Filipacchi (H-F) UK, publisher of Elle and Sugar, has appointed director of music and marketing at Sky digital music channel Music Choice Simon Bell as its first marketing director. He takes up his position on September 1.

The move follows chairman Kevin Hand’s decision in March to make managing director Vivien Cotterill’s role redundant. Cotterill was formerly managing director of Attic Futura, which was bought by French publisher Hachette in August 2002 as a stepping stone into the UK market.

The publisher subsequently pulled out of a joint venture with EMAP, which resulted in EMAP losing control of Elle and Red.

Red, launched five years ago, recently appointed DFGW to help it to increase the title’s readership, but the brief is not thought to include the Elle account at present.

H-F UK has also promoted the publisher of Sugar, tvhits! and Ellegirl, Sarah Vickery to the position of business development director. In her new role she will assume the additional responsibility for new launches and acquisitions.