The future of the Total Home Entertainment (THE) account at J Walter Thompson Manchester is hanging in the balance following a series of acrimonious exchanges between THE and the agency’s London offices. The confusion over the account’s future follows JWT London’s resignation of the Nintendo UK account last week (MW September 15) which is controlled […]
Having survived two world wars and 150 years of competition, R Whites lemonade is facing its most serious test yet in the form of own-label competition
Martin Loat
Former Saatchi & Saatchi creative director Alex Donald wants to make a comeback. He left the agency in 1989 but now believes it is time to return, but to the other side of the camera.
The globalisation of brands is more than just a name-swopping exercise – it helps products to bestow more consistent values. The danger comes when the quest for tidiness defies business logic.
A new education voucher scheme created by Sainsbury’s has been slammed as exploitative. Some schools are boycotting the scheme claiming it is labour intensive and of no educational value. The School Bags scheme was launched three weeks ago with the supermarket chain claiming it would contribute 7m to the school education system. Customers re-using carrier […]
The electricity markets demand a better quality of regulatory service, so why has Ian Lang been allowed to act so inconsistently? George Pitcher investigates
Kingfisher is reviewing its 70m media-buying account for its B&Q, Comet, Woolworths, Superdrug and Staples retailers. It will decide today (Wednesday) on a pitch list, but Mediastar, TMD Carat and incumbent Zenith are likely to be included. CIA Medianetwork has also been connected with the account. It is understood Mediastar has been trying to talk […]
American Home Products (AHP) is understood to have handed its estimated 10m to 15m account for the pan-European launch of a new range of vitamins to Publicis. The range of vitamin supplements includes the US market leader Centrum. The appointment follows a review which also included Grey and Young & Rubicam’s healthcare subsidiary, Sudler & […]
As the public becomes increasingly design literate, packaging design needs to talk to potential customers. Even in ‘difficult’ product categories such as sanpro and condoms, packs are no longer afraid to declare their contents.
Customer magazines hold out the promise of a relationship with the consumer – invaluable to fmcg brands. So will they become part of big below-the-line budgets? Meg Carter reports
Journalists are obsessive about their notebooks, but even the Diary wouldn’t claim that its notebook is a work of art (in the past, some have wrongly accused it of being a work of fiction) or, indeed, that it is worth $14m (9m). But the irrepressible advertising director Tony Kaye would. Advertisements in the New York […]
Supermarket chain Somerfield is launching an 8m campaign aimed to attract a younger, more upmarket family shopper. The push features Birds of a Feather star Lesley Joseph in two TV ads. From today (Wednesday 13) Somerfield is offering a series of discounts and multi-buy deals through its Price Check scheme. Discounts include nine products at […]
With companies seeking synergy across all their marketing, POP is no longer an afterthought, reports Martin Croft, it is at the leading edge of many campaigns
I suspect Bayer will be surprised to read in George Pitcher’s piece, “True cost of drug dependency” (MW August 25), that it is the German company that has purchased “Marion Merrell Dow in the US for 4.4bn”. Actually, the purchaser is Germany’s largest chemical and pharmaceutical group – our own parent company Hoechst AG. Tony […]