±±¾©Èü³µpk10

Camelot, the National Lottery operator, has left its media

arrangements unchanged after asking its planner and its buyer to repitch

for its pounds 30 million business.

Media Planning Group has retained the media planning account, while OMD

UK will continue to handle buying.

OMD, the incumbent on Camelot's buying business, was invited to pitch

for the planning account in February, following Camelot's controversial

retention of the Lottery licence. The review raised the possibility of

the group's media being centralised into one agency for the first time.

Media Planning scooped the planning business from Saatchi & Saatchi in

1998, when OMD grabbed the buying account from Zenith Media.

The stakes for last month's pitch were raised by Camelot's promise to

substantially increase the Lottery's marketing budget next year. This

pledge is believed to have been central to its success in trumping a

licence bid from the Richard Branson-backed People's Lottery.

Camelot retained the licence at the second attempt and has promised an

overall marketing budget of pounds 90 million in 2002, with

above-the-line spend set for pounds 40 million.

'This is a great endorsement of our strategic product unit Catalyst,'

Media Planning's managing director, Marc Mendoza, said. 'We have come

out of the process a great deal stronger with a top quality team that

includes many non-traditional disciplines. OMD has a good planning

reputation so it's very flattering to beat it and we look forward to

continuing working with it in the future.'

The creative account remains with WCRS.