By Ian McConnell
The head of a major Scottish public relations and marketing agency has declared recent signs on the trading outlook are “far more positive”, amid acceleration of the coronavirus vaccine roll-out.
Allan Barr, chief executive of Glasgow-based BIG Partnership, flagged “increasing confidence” as he revealed the agency had won 18 new contracts so far this year.
BIG last autumn made 18 staff redundant as a result of the economic impact of the coronavirus pandemic. Mr Barr noted then that this had left BIG with a headcount of 90.
He said yesterday: “For obvious reasons, 2020 was a very challenging year, both for us and for many of our clients, but we’re now able to look forward with increasing confidence to 2021.
READ MORE: Ian McConnell on Brexit: Keir Starmer U-turn dismal as Tories unable to run menodge
“Marketing spend can often be an economic bellwether and the signs we’re seeing are certainly far more positive than in recent months. With the vaccine roll-out now picking up pace, there is real reason to believe that this trend will continue.”
READ MORE: Ian McConnell on Brexit: We are now all bedevilled by bitter fruits of Tory division: Opinion
Declaring “colleagues have responded in fantastic fashion” during a “difficult period for everyone”, Mr Barr added: “The figures we’re seeing are particularly encouraging, because they’re coming from new clients as well as existing clients briefing us on fresh projects. Our many conversations with clients demonstrate that optimism is slowly building and we’re hopeful this momentum will continue to grow.”
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here