Ogilvy downsizes as job cuts continue

by Matt Cartmell, PR Week UK 28-Jan-09, 17:26

Ogilvy Group UK is the latest major agency to embark on a redundancy programme.

Following recent reviews at Lexis, Brunswick and Weber Shandwick, five per cent of Ogilvy’s 900 will depart, including both PR and advertising staff.

In a statement issued to PRWeek, WPP-owned Ogilvy said cuts were a result of the ‘prevailing economic conditions’, adding ‘there will now follow a period of consultation with the affected employees’.

Industry sources speculated that the job cuts could reach the most senior levels of its UK operation.

EMEA MD Ash Coleman-Smith would not comment on specific individuals thought to be under threat.

WPP, which also owns Hill & Knowlton and Cohn & Wolfe, is understood to be cutting back in agencies where staff costs exceed 60 per cent of revenue.

Meanwhile, Sputnik Communications has made three junior redundancies. Two account assistants and one account executive have left the company.

MD Penny Porter said there were no others on the way.

Porter joined last September after former MD Lucy Hackett and three senior members of staff left to form their own agency. Sputnik now has 13 members of staff.

Finally, Yorkshire-based PR agency TAS Communications has ceased trading, blaming private sector clients struggling with payments, including a house builder that went under owing TAS more than £50,000.

TAS director Matt Stephenson said: ‘We took the view that the situation would probably worsen before it got better and as a consequence had no alternative other than to cease trading.’