BT restructures its design roster

BT has completed a review of its design roster, following an internal examination that has lasted well over 12 months.

The final roster line-up had been finalised before Christmas, but BT has only now formally announced the identities of the groups.

Five groups have been added to the main design roster, which has a renewed emphasis on design for print, and less focus on branding.

The five newcomers are The Partners, The Team, 999, Elmwood and Lippa Pearce, which will join 14 others on the BT roster. Half a dozen groups are thought to have been taken off the roster, though BT declined to name them.

Paul Stringer, who is senior buyer for design and multimedia at BT’s marketing and communications commercial unit, says the roster review was necessitated by BT’s ‘changing company requirements’, which are expected to place less emphasis on branding work going forward, he says.

However, design for print is not a growing side of the telecoms group’s work as it turns to more and more on-line products, Stringer explains. ‘We’re doing less design for print and more multimedia work,’ he says.

Imagination and Rufus Leonard, which worked on the rebranding of the BT Tower (DW 1 April), both have longstanding relationships with the telecoms group, says Stringer, but do not appear on the design roster.

The roster review was undertaken with the design unit of the Advertising Agency Register.