Brands controlled?
I'm responsible for more than 20 markets, working on bath and facial tissue, baby and childcare, and femcare categories, including leading UK brands Andrex, Kleenex and Huggies.
What are your main priorities over the next 12 months?
Delivering great brand ideas, innovation and creativity through extraordinary planning, and continuing to improve our media cost and quality.
Agencies used?
Mindshare for planning and buying across EMEA and JWT for creative.
What are the main criteria you use when selecting an agency?
Agencies need to be experts with ideas and data, they must demonstrate confidence and their planning should consider both content and context. The aim is to liberate the truth that "everything communicates".
Advice to agencies pitching for business with new clients?
Show your understanding of people as people and not numbers, identify the most effective points to communicate with them, make decisions driven as much by gut instinct as by facts and develop ideas and executions that unite creative and behavioural thinking.
What has been your most enjoyable campaign to date?
One of our most effective campaigns was for Kleenex, where we targeted London commuters in environments where they might be more susceptible to the effects of cold and flu. An integrated campaign was developed by Mindshare that used out-of-home media on the London Underground, as well as experiential and sampling activity at key train/Tube stations.
Do you use a media auditor?
We use Fairbrother Lenz Eley for consultation - it is so much more than just an auditor.
Which medium can't you live without?
On-pack - it's probably the most under-valued and overlooked consumer touchpoint, but it can drive awareness, engagement and purchase.
Send profile suggestions to: arif.durrani@haymarket.com