J. Walter Thompson Manchester has beaten off competition from BMP DDB
Needham to pick up the pounds 4.5 million ad account for Associated Tyre
Specialists.
London-based ATS is the biggest tyre distributor and second largest
fast-fit company in Britain. It has 540 centres around the UK, which
sell batteries, exhausts, brakes and MOT tests, as well as tyres.
It had used the Leith Agency for its advertising for the past six years,
until an acrimonious split this summer provoked the two-month review.
This began with a four-way creative and strategic pitch, based on a 12-
month view of the industry, between JWT Manchester, BMP, McCann-Erickson
Birmingham and another agency which is local to ATS’s Birmingham-based
marketing department.
A further round of pitches, this time between the finalists, BMP and JWT
Manchester, took a strategic view, well beyond the 12-month period
quoted in the original brief.
JWT Manchester’s chief executive, Andrew Stothert, was delighted with
the win, which draws on the experience the agency garnered from its past
relationship with National Tyres - another leading tyre specialist. He
said: ‘Retail is in our blood, so we are delighted to add a major retail
account such as ATS to our growing list of retail accounts.’ Media
remains with the Media Shop.
The win comes only a week after JWT Manchester picked up Provincial
Insurance’s pounds 1 million advertising account, and is the latest in a
string of wins for the agency, according to its business development
director, Grant Mercer. It rounds off a good run for the Manchester
shop, which claims it has put on an extra pounds 11 million in billings
over the past four months.
