Media buying agency, MediaVest Manchester, is bigger than most people realise. Its Manchester HQ employs over 160 staff and total group numbers are above 200.
The agency styles itself as the “UK’s premier independent media specialist”.
Charlie Varley, the agency’s planning director, moved north to join the agency in April 2006. He’d taken a call from co-founder Andy Jeal the previous October asking if he “fancied working in Manchester?”
So, said Varley, “I came up, having only been to Manchester half a dozen times before – setting aside throwing the hammer competitively as an adolescent….”
Now, despite his family and four kids remaining in Oxford (although he maintains they will move up when exams are done), he says he wishes he’d made the move much earlier.
“Planning and direct response – it’s in the blood up here. People eat and breathe direct response in this town. And it’s a lot more interesting to be working here too. In this agency, my colleagues have grown up alongside entrepreneurs and business owners rather than, for example, the marketing director of Lloyds TSB who has 200 people in his marketing department.”
And business is good, indeed very good he says.
£258m billings The agency, which was set up by Andy Jeal and Dave Lucas in 1994, billed over £258m for the year ended February 2007, of which the Manchester office accounted for £203.4m, up from £182.4m the previous year. There are further MediaVest offices in Leeds and in the south.
In addition, the company has a majority stake in Fuse Sports Marketing and a minority stake in recruitment advertising specialists SMRS. In turn media conglomerate Starcom owns 19% of the agency, with Jeal and Lucas the majority shareholders and the balance held by 10 agency directors, including Varley.
New clients gained in the past few months include Castle Cover (insurance), ghd (hair styling), Hidden Hearing, Editions Atlas (collectables), Coral (additional work from long term client Gala Coral Group), Seabrook Crisps and Liverpool One (Grosvenor’s £900m retail development).
Varley, who started his career at Saatchis before moving on to WCRS during its ‘purplest’ purple patch, was working with Christine Walker in London when Jeal came knocking.
“MediaVest had just restructured with planning and buying separated” said Varley “And there was a new role for a planning director in charge of an initial team of six.”
Varley says he’s revelling in the work at MediaVest and believes the agency’s independence is a big plus point.
'Super agencies' and their financial criteria can be irksome “Following the increasing consolidation of agencies into ‘super media agencies’, there are a lot of clients out there who aren’t feeling as satisfied or as comfortable with new arrangements and new financial criteria demanded of their clients by agency bosses in London or New York.
 Charlie Varley
But it’s not just a geography and overheads issue he believes. “I believe we have, as a consequence of our substantial direct response business, more information sitting on our servers here in Manchester than the combined knowledge of London’s leading agencies.”
What also attracted Varley to Manchester was the agency’s commitment to digital business. The digital operation opened in 1999 and now employs over 40 people. Search alone, claims Varley, accounted for £26m of revenue last year, up from £17m in 2005/6.
“We have a significant revenue stream from digital” he says, “and that’s growing remarkably quickly. Clients are increasingly asking what is the best division of their marketing budget. It used to be primarily TV and print but now it’s print and TV plus radio, outdoor, online, direct response, sponsorship etc. You need a lot of resource and expertise to be able to make sense of this lot.
“But that’s how Andy and Dave have built the business – on great client service allied to great execution. In the agency itself, we’re investing a lot in business development, not just people but also the processes and systems required to ensure our approach is consistent and monitored.”
A dozen plus grads
Varley is also keen to stress the agency’s commitment to young and emerging talent.
In April and May, over a dozen graduates will be taken on. Their degrees vary from criminology to ancient civilisations. Grads at the agency start on £15,500 – a couple of £k less than London says Varley. But he is fervent in his belief that “for graduates and others starting out in media, a career at a Manchester agency is the ideal place to start. The grounding is better because the workload is usually less specialist, more generalist. This leads to much less of a silo mentality – and, I am certain, a greater and deeper expertise.
“Historically” he adds “I don’t think advertising up here has been very good at communicating its strength and size to graduates. Too many graduates assume they have to go to London but this really isn’t the case.”
It’s not just the size of the media business in Manchester which has critical mass he says, he also feels media courses have come a long way since he was considering his options for a place at University in the 80s. “I’ve always rated Lancaster highly for its media courses but others in the North West need to review their output, too many are hit and miss.” http://www.mvmediagroup.co.uk Something to add? Then leave a comment below or email us now.
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