Coca-Cola GB has axed two directors’ posts in a move to slim down the company’s sprawling marketing structure. The shake-up comes as three marketing executives leave the UK to take up posts in the US. Brands director Steve Moore, who reports to marketing director George Bradt, is returning to the US. It is understood he […]

Woollams Moira Gaskin O’Malley has suffered another serious setback with the loss of its flagship 10m Mercury One-2-One phone account to Bartle Bogle Hegarty. WMGO has held the account – its largest – since the mobile phone operator launched in September 1993. WMGO reached the final four shortlisted agencies in the recent review, but was […]

In Greek mythology, Procrustes was a highway robber with the rather distressing habit of tying his victims to an iron bed. If their limbs were too long, he hacked them off; if too short, he stretched them to fit. In the current version of this fable, advertisers have cast themselves as the innocent wayfarer. Media […]

MEDIA Campaign for Media Choice has been launched by cable companies opposing BSkyB’s recent programme deals with TeleWest and Nynex.

Procter & Gamble has kicked off a test launch of its toiletries range, called Infasil, in the Irish market and is considering a pan-European roll-out for the products.

Most marketing departments are still built around products and product managers, but there’s a whiff of change in the air. Companies are waking up to the fact that their most important asset is their customer base.

Are customer magazines feelgood, glossy products intended to reward loyal consumers, or are they just cynical vehicles for milking the public about their purchasing patterns? Martin Croft reports on how companies are treating their valued read

IPC Magazines has replaced Colin Reeve-Smith, managing director of the monthlies division which publishes titles such as Marie Claire and Essentials, with Nigel Davidson, managing director of IPC weeklies. Reeve-Smith, who has been managing director of the IPC SouthBank Group for ten years, will take on an international and business development role. Davidson will remain […]

CM: Lintas International and BBDO have lost all their SmithKline Beecham Consumer Healthcare business to Ogilvy & Mather in a global realignment of the healthcare company’s 300m advertising account. O&M has scooped the worldwide advertising for the former Sterling Health brands which were handled by CM: Lintas and BBDO, before it was bought by SB […]

BT has confirmed details of 26 advertisers committed to participating in its Interactive TV (ITTV) trials which go live with 2,500 consumers in August. Allied Domecq, Grand Metropolitan, Levi-Strauss, Pedigree Petfoods, Pepsi, Toyota and Vauxhall are among participants in the AdLand channel, a discrete advertiser-only environment to be offered as part of the ITTV service. […]

Against a background of sustained booing and whistling, the president of the Cannes International Advertising Festival jury, Frank Lowe, presented the Agency of the Year award to Lowe Howard-Spink of London, part of the Lowe Group of which he is chairman and chief executive. It was the culmination of a bad night for Lowe. The […]

Ann Iverson was tipped last year to take up the helm at Laura Ashley. It seemed just the sort of challenge she would rise to – a high-profile brand with great intrinsic qualities, but one going through problems and in need of a new direction. Instead, Iverson, 51, left her position as chief executive of […]

Jewellery retailer the Signet Group has created the post of marketing controller at its chains H Samuel and Ernest Jones, and has made three appointments. Signet UK marketing director Dianne Thompson says the appointments complete plans to set up an effective marketing structure at the troubled retail group. The two chains are being relaunched following […]

PepsiCo is to spend 3m on the UK relaunch of its Club Pepsi Max promotion, which will feature a new series of celebrity advertisements. Supermodel Cindy Crawford, who already advertises the Pepsi brand, will be joined by Baywatch star Pamela Anderson, tennis star André Agassi and actors Jean Claude Van Damme and Luke Perry in […]

Club Max promotion creator and Pepsi Cola’s European marketing director Charlotte Pinder is to become general manager for Ireland in a reshuffle of its European marketing team. She will succeed Simon Calver, the general manager for Pepsi Cola International Ireland who moves to become area vice president. He replaces Stacey Clark, who left to become […]