TBWA\Manchester's Nissan account moves to London
The Nissan dealerships ad account, which has been handled by TBWA\Manchester for the last decade, has been moved to TBWA’s London office, The Drum has learned.
Robert Harwood-Matthews, once TBWA’s chief executive for Manchester and now the agency’s UK president, confirmed that the account is now being run from London.
The account has been held in Manchester since 2000, when the £15m business was picked up by the agency then known as BDH\TBWA.
Its move to London closely follows Harwood-Matthews’ return to TBWA UK, and the capital, after spells at Infiniti and PHD in America.
But he denied that he was the author of the business move and said it would serve him no commercial benefit for the account to be handled in London.
“I have got a good relationship with Nissan and I have worked with them throughout my time with TBWA, even my job in LA [with Infiniti] included working with them, but the change in strategy has nothing to do with me,” Harwood-Matthews told The Drum.
“The client is based about 40 minutes away from TBWA\London and what they asked for was a consolidated unit. It was a complete coincidence because the current marketing director is not somebody who was around when I was working in Manchester.
“[Nissan] are doing very well, their shares are growing tremendously and they said that they wanted a unit right on their doorstep so we had to consolidate.”
Harwood-Matthews said that as his financial responsibility as UK president covers the Manchester office as well as London, there would be nothing to gain for his balance sheets by moving the business south. It would be tantamount to “robbing Peter to pay Paul,” he said.
He also insisted that no staff have been made redundant because of the move. Those affected have already moved to London to continue working on the account, he said.
“Nobody lost their jobs off of the back of it. Probably half-a-dozen staff that worked at the Manchester operation, they simply decided that they wanted to come down and have a go here which was fantastic because it was good for everyone.”
Harwood-Matthews was never shy to air his views on the regional agency scene when he was in Manchester, and he admitted the Nissan switch has been “a tough thing to go through, especially for Manchester”.
“It was distressing for me as I’ve argued the toss for the regions and why it shouldn’t matter where you are, but things are moving so fast in our business at the moment.
“Manchester is going gangbusters anyway with new business, especially as lead agency for Co-Operative. So Fergus [McCallum, TBWA\Manchester’s chief exec] is happy, I’m happy and on we go.”