Pravda wins £2m work for holiday company Neilson

Pravda Advertising has been handed the &£2m advertising business for specialist ski and activity holiday company Neilson.

The agency, which has offices in Manchester and London, was given the business by marketing director Joe Lynch without a pitch. The previous incumbent was Hemisphere. Freelancer Bill Barker will handle media planning and OMD UK media buying.

Pravda will develop a new branding for Neilson and develop a customer relationship management programme and advertising campaign. The latter will include outdoor, press and online activity and will break after Christmas.

Neilson is owned by Thomas Cook and based in Brighton. Its holiday products include skiing and snowboarding, windsurfing, scuba diving and sailing holidays. The company launched as an independent in 1979 and became part of Sun World, which was bought by Thomas Cook in 1996.

Pravda was founded two years ago and its partners are Simon Sinclair, a former creative partner at McCann Erickson, Tim Trapp, a former head of account management at Soul, and Phil Howells, a former senior art director at Still Price Lintas.

Thomas Cook is talking to integrated agencies about handling advertising and direct marketing for its main brand. It parted company with TBWA/London in July and insists it will not have an agency of record but form a roster of agencies (MW July 22).