MEDIA: FOR THE RECORD

Leo Burnett has ended its search for a head of radio by appointing Simon

Ward, a sales executive at Independent Radio Sales. Ward replaces Vicky

Richardson who announced she was leaving to go travelling last November.

Ward has worked at IRS since 1993 and recently concentrated specifically

on the Kiss account. Previously he worked at Zenith as a media buyer.

MTV Europe has teamed up with the ground-breaking US magazine publisher,

Ray Gun, in a licensing deal to produce the channel’s first youth

culture and lifestyle magazine. The magazine, Blah Blah Blah, is the

brainchild of Marvin Scott Jarrett, owner of Ray Gun. It launches in the

UK on 14 March. Local language versions will follow.

Ian Ashcroft has been appointed managing director of the Manchester

Evening News and chief executive of the Guardian Media Group’s

Manchester division. Ashcroft is currently deputy managing director of

Guardian Newspapers, the group’s national newspaper division, and

managing director of the Guardian Press Centre. He will take up his new

role from April.

The Derby Evening Telegraph, part of the Northcliffe group, is launching

an ‘early bird’ edition. Research by the paper showed that national

papers were bought during the afternoon as well as in the morning. The

paper aims to pick up extra readers by being on sale throughout the day.

The new early edition will go to press at 12am and be on sale from 6am.

Previously, the first edition of the newspaper went on sale at 10.30am.

ITV has appointed Sam Carter as its new marketing manager. Carter begins

work at the ITV Network Centre next month, reporting to the director of

the ITV Association, Barry Cox. Her brief will be to co-ordinate and

drive forward the ITV marketing group’s activities in promoting ITV’s

brand more vigorously. Her appointment coincides with the group’s recent

appointment of M&C Saatchi to handle the ITV account.

A new survey commissioned by the UK’s leading directory publisher,

Yellow Pages, reveals that people in Britain are not logging on to the

Internet because they believe it to be too complicated and unfriendly.

The survey, carried out by National Opinion Polls, found that 91 per

cent of those surveyed said they had not used the Internet and the key

reason was because they believed it to be difficult to use. Despite

this, more than half of the non-users surveyed (58 per cent) claimed to

be well-informed about the Internet.

Sir John Harvey-Jones is to deliver the opening address at this year’s

Radio Advertising Bureau conference at London’s Royal Lancaster Hotel on

15 October. The speech will contain a review of the commercial radio

industry as an advertising medium. Douglas McArthur (pictured), managing

director of the RAB, said: ‘We believe his analysis of the potential

role of radio for the advertiser will be enormously valuable for

everyone who spends money, at whatever level, in the medium.’

Atlantic 252 has kicked off a pounds 250,000 ad campaign supporting its

pounds 100,000 ‘free money Monday’ promotion throughout the remainder of

January and February. The campaign will appear on six-sheet posters, bus

sides and in the national press in key regions across the UK. The

promotion is designed to attract both new listeners and retain existing

ones.

Lowe Howard-Spink has unveiled its restructured media department. Rob

McIntosh joins as joint media director from Grey’s entertainment

subsidiary, Gem. Gary Birtles was promoted as the other joint media

director. Lowes has poached Duff Borer from WCRS and Hitesh Bhatt

rejoins as TV buyer after a year away.

This article was first published on Campaign