‘Our strategy is about location, with a focus on big businesses that are not London-centric or TV-centric’, says Iain Ferguson, chief executive of The Mission Marketing Group, which he plans to build into the first ‘regional super-agency’ under an ‘A-list’ board that includes Tory chairman Francis Maude.

The company joined AIM following a £14.8m placing in April, at the same time completing the transformational acquisition of Bray Leino.

Regional agency Bray Leino (which boasts Wrigleys and Bausch & Lomb as clients) brought scale to the existing businesses – the award-winning Big Communications and new media-marketing specialist Fuse Digital. The acquisition also created the UK’s third biggest regional agency.

For calendar 2005 the enlarged group sported combined revenues of £47.5m and operating profits of £4.1m, admittedly before goodwill and non-recurring items. The charismatic Ferguson is now scouting for other regionally based marketing agencies at the right price, in order to build an agency with strong national and regional reach, offering an expansive range of marketing services to clients.

Ferguson insists regional agencies have lower staff costs, higher margins and a higher return on capital than London agencies and believes The Mission will benefit from a rising proportion of the marketing budget being allocated to regional players. Major companies are demanding alternatives to ‘the traditional mass media legacy’ model, advertisers want greater coverage in the regions and international companies are relocating to these areas.

Operating in a UK marketing services sector worth more than £30bn in 2004 and expected to reach £33bn in 2006, The Mission is supported by a who’s who of institutional investors. Growth Company Investor likes the story so far. Buy.

The Mission Marketing Group	AIM	£16.54m	50.00p	0.00p
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