New department head restructures 3’s marketing

John Penberthy-Smith, the new marketing director at mobile operator 3, has restructured the company’s marketing in a bid to “drive the brand forward”. The news follows the appointment of Euro RSCG as its new advertising agency last week.

Penberthy-Smith, who joined 3 from Vodafone last year and took over from Graeme Oxby as marketing director in January, has moved Hutchison marketer Fergal Walker to the role of director for handsets and brought Stephen Ford in from 3 Australia as director of customer propositions. 

The company is also looking for a director of product management, a director of integrated communications and a director of base management to complete the new team.

The reshuffle follows a host of changes in 3’s marketing department in recent months. Director of brand and marketing communications Gary Pepler, who joined from Sony in June 2006, left at the end of last year after less than six months. He replaced WCRS partner Julian Hough, who had been on secondment as the mobile operator’s marketing director for two years.

Pepler left the company along with Sarah Haythornthwaite, head of customer experience, and head of customer communications Melanie Fenwick as part of the 130 redundancies that 3 announced at the end of last year (MW November 30, 2006).

Penberthy-Smith says of the changes: “It had a very strong product team. The structure I’m building will drive marketing forward because marketing should drive sales.”