“To this end, we have restructured his working arrangements and we are delighted that Liam will continue working with us in a strategic and planning capacity. Liam will be looking after his client portfolio as usual and will continue to have a key input into the development of the agency.”
Pender has more than 15 years’ experience in the industry. Previously he was the media director at Cawley Nea, a director at MindShare and also worked at McCann-Erickson, DDFH&B and McConnells. He joined GT in 2004, but was a shareholder.
Taylor, the company’s chief executive, said he had assumed Pender’s role for the time being. GT is the largest independent media-buying agency in Ireland with annual billings of €20m. It was set up in 1983 and its clients include the Gowan Group, Allianz and Domino’s Pizza.
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Dublin city council retains Murphy
Mary Murphy Associates has beaten off four of the big agencies in Irish public relations to retain Dublin city council’s corporate services PR account.
Drury Communications, Financial Dynamics, Slattery Communications and Wilson Hartnell PR all made the shake-up for the account but Murphy saw them off. Figures from the council show Murphy earned €162,700 in fees over the past two years.
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Wall Street moves to Offaly
Last week brought the announcement that the Wall Street Journal’s European edition would be printed in the republic by the Midland Tribune in Offaly. This deal begins on Wednesday and is aimed at getting the paper, now published in a compact format, into shops earlier in the day. The contract will service the Irish market, where its circulation 552.
In Northern Ireland, the all-Ireland edition of the Sunday Express and the northern edition of the Daily Star Sunday have moved their contracts to the Newsletter, which is owned by Johnston Press. Both tabloids were previously printed by Morton Newspapers of Portadown, also under the ownership of Johnston Press. Morton recently secured a contract to print the Irish editions of The Guardian.
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()Chambers makes a market move
Given the small number of market research companies operating in this sector, it is rare for senior executives to switch sides. This is why Vivian Chambers’ move from Behaviour & Attitudes to Research Solutions has raised a few eyebrows.
Chambers has become a director at Research Solutions, which was acquired last year by Amarach Consulting, a leading Irish-owned research group. Its founder, Bernadette Coyne, continues to run the firm.
Research Solutions conducts ad-hoc research and its clients include Vodafone, Aer Lingus, Ulster Bank, Coca-Cola, Toyota, and Luas. Founded six years ago, it has 26 staff and turnover of €3m, according to Coyne.
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Eircom League scores in TV ratings
It might be the poor relation to the GAA’s All-Ireland championships or rugby’s Heineken Cup, but Eircom League bosses must be encouraged with the television audience figures that its live matches attracted last year.
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In a novel deal signed last February, RTE, Setanta and TG4 all provided live coverage of domestic and European matches involving Eircom League clubs in 2005. In total, 44 games were shown live last year, a big step up in coverage on previous seasons, giving the much-maligned league a higher public profile.
League matches shown on RTE and TG4 attracted 933,000 viewers, with 355,000 tuning in for the title decider between Cork City and Derry City. Another 533,000 viewers tuned in for FAI Cup matches, while a little more than 1.1m followed the exploits of Shelbourne and Cork City in Europe.
A stand-off between Setanta and ACNielsen over the compilation of audience ratings means there are no figures available for the sports channel.
News travels fast for Heneghan PR
Gulf Air has appointed Heneghan PR to handle its public relations activity in Ireland following the launch last month of three flights a week from Dublin to Bahrain. Heneghan will handle consumer and corporate PR for the airline.
Heneghan has also won an account with DX Ireland, which provides early morning, next-day postal delivery services for businesses across the country. DX delivers more than 10m items a year on behalf of nearly 4,000 clients.
The company is examining the feasibility of entering the door-to-door postal sector in competition with An Post.