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Movings/Shakings: 13 April

Jessica Knox is added to the MediaWorks Radio arsenal, Jason Jones takes over photographers’ agency Collective Force, Taxi Impact welcomes Felicity-Anne Flack as agency sales director, AUT students Devon Wood and Stacey Vergis take creative title, the PR Shop announces a new import, Ecoya finds some extra moolah and Getty shacks up with Lonely Planet. 

Knox on

MediaWorks Radio has appointed Jessica Knox to the position of business development and product manager.

Knox has worked in the Auckland radio market for some years, most recently as national head of client services and trade marketing for The Radio Network where she developed and managed one of the most effective loyalty programmes in the Auckland market, and she views her move into the sales management team at MediaWorks Radio Auckland as an opportunity to leverage her skills to benefit the business.

“MediaWorks continues to deliver solutions that generate results for clients and the overall business alike,” she says. “I’m excited to join an organisation that keeps clients top of mind and an eye on the bottom line; a business which has a reputation for exceptional customer service while delivering measurable results on a win-win basis.”

Knox has experience in local and international media, beginning her career in the US working for directors and producers and later producing photo shoots, commercials, music videos and visual effects and main titles for films and TV such as National Lampoon’s Van Wilder and CBS’s First Monday. Knox is also represented as a writer in the US.

Director of sales and branded content Paul Hancox says Knox’s intricate knowledge of critical radio sales incentive and product development environments see her well positioned to add value to the business and represents a significant advantage for MediaWorks Radio.

Keeping up with the Jones

Jason Jones, former creative services manager for DraftFCB and more recently head of integrated production at Sugar, has acquired The Collective Force, New Zealand’s first photographers’ agency.

He takes over from Christina Force, who set up the company in 1996 after arriving in New Zealand from the London ad industry. Building it into an international go-to agency, Force introduced local photographers to Asia and the USA, bringing countless global campaigns to New Zealand’s shores.

More recently, Force decided to go solo and move into consulting to photographers and she will remain part of The Collective Force as consultant until April 2014.

“When Jason approached me about buying The Collective Force it was perfect timing as my folio consulting practice was taking off,” she says. “I’m so happy to see the brand live on and Jason has the perfect experience, passion and energy to take the brand further.”

Over the years Jones has predominantly been art buying, helping creatives execute award-winning campaigns on time and on budget. Responsible for commissioning the most suitable photographer for each concept saw him exposed to the best talent, creatively and photographically.

“The Collective Force is a well-known brand and offers me a platform to re-build what I hope to be the country’s most successful photographic agency. Christina has such a depth of knowledge retaining her as a consultant made perfect sense … I am looking forward to announcing the first photographers to join The Collective Force stable. In the meantime we’re working with a number of talented independent photographers and can provide the perfect solution to your next photographic project.”

Contact [email protected]/ 021 773 244 or [email protected]/ 021 528 385.

Taking Flack

Felicity-Anne Flack has joined the team at Taxi Impact as sales director for agencies.

She has a wide media background and has previously worked as ad manager at NZ Woman’s Weekly, national business development manager for Adshel and, most recently, in a contract capacity at Cossack Consultancy.

“Taxi media has real value to advertisers and I’m looking forward to making this a go-to medium for OOH campaigns,” she says.

Contact her at [email protected]

Bright young things

AUT University held its School of Communications Awards ceremony last week and Advertising Creativity students Stacey Vergis and Devon Wood, who are now at TBWA and were behind the 2degrees ‘Grumpy Birds‘ ad and the St Matthew-in-the-City Easter billboard, were handed the TVNZ Creative Team of the Year Award.

Ben Fisher, a creative director at TVNZ and an ex Curious Films director, presented the award on behalf of TVNZ, who have been sponsoring AUT adschool awards since 2009.

“We worked with Ben last year when he was part of the briefing team on the TVNZ/AXIS student award brief, the winner of which is due to be announced and presented with a mini AXIS on AXIS night,” says AUT’s Paul White.

Also on the night Kevin Walker, who’s currently at DraftFCB with his art director Melina Fiolitakis, won TVNZ copywriter of the year and Jaime Kneale, who was hired with his copywriter Mike Howard by Consortium a month ago, won TVNZ art director of the year.

Politzer prize

The PR Shop has appointed Amanda Politzer as group account director in its Auckland office.

Formerly occupying senior positions at some of the UK’s top PR agencies, she brings 15 years of PR and communications experience after emmigrating to New Zealand from England last year. She has a wealth of experience in a broad range of sectors including, consumer, B2B, healthcare, travel and tourism, FMCG, education, technology, sustainability, property and construction.

“With Amanda’s international experience at some of the best-respected consultancies in the UK, we’re thrilled about the growth of our Auckland team,” says director Sally Frewin. “Her energy, knowledge and exceptional people skills will be a terrific addition to an already exciting 2012 for us.”

Her appointment closely follows the arrival of Amanda Kuhn as head of PR in the Sydney office.

Ecoya blimey

Thanks to Pie Funds and existing institutional investor Milford Asset Management, Ecoya has snapped up an additional $2 million in funds. The investment will be through a new share issue of $1.7 million to Pie Funds and $300,000 to Milford at a share price of 90 cents.

Ecoya last month signed a deal to bring its products into Japan and chairman and chief executive Geoff Ross said there were opportunities for both the Ecoya and Trilogy brands coming up. The cash injection would be initially used to reduce debt.

“Whilst we are happy with Ecoya’s capital structure and current level of debt funding we thought it useful to have Pie Funds on our register.”Pie Funds is a boutique investment manager based in Takapuna, Auckland.“We think the company has a bright future with a lot of upside potential,” said managing director Mike Taylor. “We like to invest in small companies that have the ability to grow revenue and profits significantly. We also like companies with dynamic CEOs such as Geoff Ross and good industry trends. Above all Pie Funds must be able to foresee substantial share price appreciation in the future. Ecoya definitely fits the bill and on top of that both Trilogy and Ecoya are fantastic products.

Getty gets going with Lonely Planet

Getty Images has announced a new partnership with Lonely Planet that sees it become the sole global distributor for its library of travel images.

The updated collection, built that up over the past 14 years, will include over 420,000 contemporary travel photographs from Lonely Planet Images. As part of the partnership, Getty Images will also offer to represent Lonely Planet’s world-renowned photographers, providing them with an even stronger presence in the global image market. Lonely Planet Images currently receives between 50,000-70,000 exclusive new assets annually from approximately 370 photographers.

“We have represented a small portion of Lonely Planet’s content for a number of years and so we are delighted to announce this new and expanded partnership,” says Andy Saunders, senior vice president, creative content at Getty Images. “Lonely Planet Images contains some of the best travel content from across the world, shot by a high calibre of photographers. Complementing our creative offering, these images will continue to provide our customers with access to an even broader range of international and local travel content—at a time when it can be costly for media to invest in shooting this type of content themselves.”

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