NEWS: HOTLINE

Penny Furniss, the new-business director at BST-BDDP since 1992, has

handed in her notice and will leave the agency in a month. Furniss told

Campaign: ‘This may be the first time that this phrase has been used

truthfully, but I wish to spend time in the summer with my children.’

Furniss is considering a number of options.

Initial figures indicate that ITV attracted 16 million viewers for its

coverage of the England versus Holland Euro 96 match on Tuesday. The

Scotland versus Switzerland match, which was broadcast live in Scotland,

drew 1.6 million viewers, giving ITV a 56.5 per cent share of the

evening’s TV audience.

The Planet on Sunday has closed after one issue. The paper was shut by

its backer and publisher, Clifford Hards, who has made 12 staff

redundant. The paper launched on 16 June but Hards said its content did

not satisfy his personal criteria. The Planet claimed to have achieved

sales of 115,000, and Hards says it will meet all outstanding financial

commitments.

Fuji seems to have resolved its dilemma over whether to go for a

European-wide network or a country-by-country agency appointment

following its split with Saatchi and Saatchi (Campaign, 8 March). The

European strategic planning manager, Peter Sanwell, has devised a

compromise by organising pitches between Dentsu, which owns a different

agency in each of Fuji’s main markets; Campus, which is a loose

association of agencies in different countries; and an agency selected

by staff in each of Germany, the UK and France. Pitches will be held in

September.

Conservation groups have attacked Government plans to abolish controls

which ban posters in rural areas, and warn that the British countryside

will be disfigured by US-style giant billboards. But the Department of

the Environment said poster companies would still need permission from

local authorities.

Abbey National is poised to rebrand its General Insurance division as a

completely separate direct insurance arm this week. An integrated pounds

20 million campaign will break in November through Duckworth Finn Grubb

Waters, Zenith Media, Claydon Heeley International and Coley Porter

Bell.

Debenhams has denied that there will be any change to the advertising

agency arrangements for its pounds 13 million account following the the

departure of advertising and promotions director, Alison Dow, in a

restructuring. The retailer’s incumbent agency is TBWA, but it also took

on Knight Leach Delaney to handle part of the account last month

(Campaign, 17 May).

Patricia Mann, J. Walter Thompson’s director of public affairs, has been

awarded an OBE in the Queen’s birthday honours for services to the Food

Advisory Committee. Mann sits on the JWT and the European Advertising

Tripartite boards and for ten years served as a Monopolies and Mergers

Commissioner.

Ammirati Puris Lintas has hired the British creative, David Schaller, to

head its new ideas engineering unit in New York. The unit has been set

up to develop non-traditional forms of communications. APL in London

will be able to draw on the new resource. Schaller worked at Imagination

from 1985 to 1992 and since then has worked in the US.

Epson, the Japanese office equipment giant, is understood to have

awarded its first pan-European advertising account to BBDO, following a

lengthy review (Campaign, 1 March). The role, for which BBDO beat the

BDDP network and Bozell Worldwide, will be to handle any advertising at

the pan-European level. The account will be handled out of BBDO’s

Amsterdam office. Country-by-country campaigns will still be run by the

incumbent in each of its main markets - Dowell and Associates in the UK.

Guardian Newspapers has moved the southern print run of the Guardian and

Observer newspapers into West Ferry Printers, jointly owned by the

Express and Telegraph groups. The Guardian Press Centre will close.

This article was first published on Campaign