Bailey's redesign aims for modern look

R&A Bailey is hoping a major re-design of Baileys can propel the drink into the top five spirit brands in the world.

With a potential marketing spend of between € 3 and € 4 million a new Baileys bottle will appear in pubs, clubs and off-licences in May, said chief executive Ms Wendy Darlington yesterday.

The landscape shot on the front of the bottle, in place since the early 1970s, is being dropped. Instead of pastoral pictures of the Irish countryside, the company will use several intertwined colours to represent the coming together of Irish cream and whiskey.

Ms Darlington said Baileys had come a long way from its origins as an after-dinner drink. "More and more people are enjoying Baileys as part of their modern, ever-day lives, not just on special occasions or traditional get-togethers".

She said the Irishness and heritage of the brand was being retained but given a more modern and stylish feel.

The Diageo-owned brand is now on the brink of breaking into the top five spirit brands in the world. R & A Bailey has set itself a target of selling 10 million cases by 2007, with heavy growth in Europe and the US contributing to this.

The five biggest spirit brands in the world are currently: Bacardi, Smirnoff, Absolut Vodka, Johnny Walker and Jack Daniels. Baileys is currently ranked number six.

Ms Darlington, who replaced Mr Frank Fenn as chief executive at the start of the year, said different formats of Baileys were also helping sales. The Baileys Minis and a new format in Britain, the Baileys Glide, allowed consumers to sample the drink in new settings.

The new bottle was designed by agency Landor, which has previously worked with Pizza Hut, Kraft Foods and Smirnoff.

Grey/Helme merger

As reported here a few weeks ago, Dublin agencies the Helme Partnership and Grey Advertising have been in discussions about a merger for several months and yesterday the deal was concluded.

Grey will acquire 100 per cent equity in the Helme Partnership. The value of this transaction was not disclosed. For the 36 staff at both agencies there will be no job losses. The new entity will be called Grey Helme.

Under the terms of the agreement, Grey Advertising has acquired the shareholding of the three equity partners in the Helme Partnership, Mr Donald Helme, Mr Louis McConkey and Mr Dale Parry, all of whom will be joining the board of Grey Helme. They will join existing Grey directors Mr Philip Sherwood, Ms Maureen Carrigan, Ms Ciara Gleeson and Mr John Carvill.

Grey Advertising, in Ireland since 1995, is part of the Grey Global Group, the seventh largest marketing communications company in the world.

The managing director of Grey, Mr Philip Sherwood, who is president of the Institute of Advertising Practitioners in Ireland, said: "We have been talking for quite a long time, we understand each other and we think the same way".

The Helme Partnership was set up in 1986 by Donald Helme, formerly of Youngs and Arks. It has worked for a variety of clients including Miller Brewing, Eagle Star Insurance, Beamish & Crawford, Batchelors, Tipperary Water, Irish Distillers and DCC Foods.

Mr Helme said it had been difficult to operate as a medium sized Irish-owned independent agency in the last few years. "Most agencies are internationally aligned today and Grey were looking to grow from their power base too, so the combination of objectives is spot-on".

Irish Life account

Irish Life has appointed Chemistry as its advertising agency, with incumbent DDFH&B losing out. Six agencies made the shortlist: Leo Burnett, McCann Erickson, Ogilvy, Rothco, Chemistry and DDFH&B. Mr Brendan McEvoy, executive manager, marketing, at Irish Life retail, said: "We went through a very thorough pitch process. While we were very impressed with the standard of presentations overall, Chemistry had a real edge in terms of strategic thinking and creativity."

Chemistry's existing clients include Coca-Cola, First Active, Irish Distillers, Kepak Convenience Foods, Meteor Mobile, Peugeot and RecruitIreland.com.

NTL adds station

NTL Ireland has added another channel to its digital TV offering. The MTV-owned station, the Music Factory, will become part of the line-up from this Monday.

NTL said in a performance survey, conducted by ratings agency BARB in the UK, that the Music Factory was the fourth most watched digital channel amongst 16 - 34 year olds.

RTÉ-TV3 deal

RTÉ Sport has agreed to sell five Euro 2004 matches to TV3 for an undisclosed sum. RTÉ has rights to the matches because of its membership of the European Broadcasting Union (EBU).

But competition considerations have prompted the EBU to advise members they must transfer some games to privately owned rivals. TV3 has won four final group matches and one ordinary group match. The station has informed advertising agencies about the development.

Fashion to radio

UK retailer French Connection (FCUK) is to launch its own radio station and 315,000 Irish Sky Digital TV subscribers will be able to tune into it on channel 934.

French Connection has commissioned a radio production company to operate the station which will also be broadcast in all FCUK stores.

Luas to get ads

Testing of the new Luas carriages is well under way and now the Railway Procurement Agency is pressing ahead with plans for advertising on board. A three-year contract to manage the advertising account has been put out to tender.

Competition for the contract is likely to be fierce.

Emmet Oliver can be reached at eoliver@irish-times.ie