Company Summary
Our Client help brands make retail marketing work harder across local and global markets. Combining insight, strategy, creative thinking and practical delivery to create brand activations that get noticed, understood and chosen.
The Role
The Print & Production Services Director owns the Company's UK's print and production capability, ensuring every client-facing print, POS and in-store execution is delivered on brand, on budget and on time. The role sits at the intersection of creative delivery and supply chain management: translating creative and client requirements into production-ready specifications, managing a resilient supplier network, and driving cost efficiency and sustainability across the production lifecycle. Beyond delivery this is a growth role through margin maximisation, differentiation through production credibility and landing cross-business opportunities with existing clients. As the Company moves to its new pod-based operating model, this role is the senior production authority that Client Growth pods and Creative Operations rely on for feasibility, cost and timeline advice from brief through to delivery, and a standalone SLT voice on how production capability supports the agency's wider growth agenda.
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01 Responsibilities
**Production Strategy & Leadership**
- Define and lead this department's and the Company's UK vision to be the most effective retail marketing agency by 2028.
- Own the print and production services strategy and execution ensuring you are aligned to client segmentation and the wider operating model redesign.
- Act as the senior escalation point for production feasibility, cost and risk across all pods and client accounts.
**Supplier & Vendor Management**
- Build and manage a panel of print, POS, permanent POS and production suppliers, negotiating commercial terms, rate cards and SLAs.
- Own supplier performance management, quality audits and contingency planning to protect delivery resilience.
- Lead sourcing and tendering for new production categories or capacity as client needs evolve.
**Quality, Cost & Compliance**
- Set and maintain production quality standards and sign-off processes across all physical deliverables.
- Own production cost governance — estimating, margin protection and growth, and cost-efficiency initiatives — working with Finance and pod leads.
- Ensure production activity meets environmental, sustainability and regulatory requirements, and drive continuous improvement against sustainability commitments.
- Own contract compliance across the supplier panel and relevant client agreements — ensuring terms, SLAs and renewals are tracked and adhered to, working with Legal and Finance to manage risk.
**Team Leadership**
- As part of the Leadership Team, share accountability for delivering the business's overall strategy, not solely production-specific goals.
- Coach and develop the three Director-level leads, embedding clear ways of working with Creative Operations and Client Growth across print, POS and new store production.
- Own capacity planning and resourcing across the wider function, including peak-period and campaign surge planning.
- Contribute to service line development beyond core print/POS — e.g. screen deployment, brand experience and events — helping shape where the Company's UK's production capability expands next.
**Growth & Commercial Impact**
- Act as a key production voice in new business pitches, bringing feasibility, cost credibility and innovation that strengthens the competitive position.
- Identify and drive efficiency and effectiveness improvements across the production function that protect margin and free up capacity for growth.
- Partner with Client Growth pods to spot in-business growth opportunities — new categories, formats or services — where production capability can unlock incremental client spend.
- Represent production as a differentiator in The Company's UK's growth story, not solely a delivery function, at SLT and client level.
**Client & Stakeholder Collaboration**
- Work directly with pod leads and clients on complex or high-value production requirements, providing specialist advice from brief stage onward.
- Represent production services in SLT and governance forums relevant to the operating model and IPA Effectiveness accreditation workstreams where production evidence is required.
- Collaborate with the Business Group on Marketing Execution Services (MES) strategy, and support Group-led clients and Group-led new business pitches with production expertise, feasibility and cost input.
Apply Now
- Define and lead this department's and the Company's UK vision to be the most effective retail marketing agency by 2028.
- Own the print and production services strategy and execution ensuring you are aligned to client segmentation and the wider operating model redesign.
- Act as the senior escalation point for production feasibility, cost and risk across all pods and client accounts.
**Supplier & Vendor Management**
- Build and manage a panel of print, POS, permanent POS and production suppliers, negotiating commercial terms, rate cards and SLAs.
- Own supplier performance management, quality audits and contingency planning to protect delivery resilience.
- Lead sourcing and tendering for new production categories or capacity as client needs evolve.
**Quality, Cost & Compliance**
- Set and maintain production quality standards and sign-off processes across all physical deliverables.
- Own production cost governance — estimating, margin protection and growth, and cost-efficiency initiatives — working with Finance and pod leads.
- Ensure production activity meets environmental, sustainability and regulatory requirements, and drive continuous improvement against sustainability commitments.
- Own contract compliance across the supplier panel and relevant client agreements — ensuring terms, SLAs and renewals are tracked and adhered to, working with Legal and Finance to manage risk.
**Team Leadership**
- As part of the Leadership Team, share accountability for delivering the business's overall strategy, not solely production-specific goals.
- Coach and develop the three Director-level leads, embedding clear ways of working with Creative Operations and Client Growth across print, POS and new store production.
- Own capacity planning and resourcing across the wider function, including peak-period and campaign surge planning.
- Contribute to service line development beyond core print/POS — e.g. screen deployment, brand experience and events — helping shape where the Company's UK's production capability expands next.
**Growth & Commercial Impact**
- Act as a key production voice in new business pitches, bringing feasibility, cost credibility and innovation that strengthens the competitive position.
- Identify and drive efficiency and effectiveness improvements across the production function that protect margin and free up capacity for growth.
- Partner with Client Growth pods to spot in-business growth opportunities — new categories, formats or services — where production capability can unlock incremental client spend.
- Represent production as a differentiator in The Company's UK's growth story, not solely a delivery function, at SLT and client level.
**Client & Stakeholder Collaboration**
- Work directly with pod leads and clients on complex or high-value production requirements, providing specialist advice from brief stage onward.
- Represent production services in SLT and governance forums relevant to the operating model and IPA Effectiveness accreditation workstreams where production evidence is required.
- Collaborate with the Business Group on Marketing Execution Services (MES) strategy, and support Group-led clients and Group-led new business pitches with production expertise, feasibility and cost input.
02 Knowledge
- Substantial experience (typically 10+ years) in print and production management, including significant time at a senior/leadership level leading through other managers or directors, ideally across a function of comparable size (c. 30 people).
- Background in a retail marketing, POS, brand activation or creative agency environment strongly preferred.
- Proven track record building and managing supplier/vendor networks, including commercial negotiation.
- Experience operating in a matrixed or pod-based delivery model, working closely with client-facing and creative teams.
- Experience embedding sustainability standards into production processes is an advantage.
03 Experience
- Strong commercial acumen with the ability to balance cost, quality and speed.
- Excellent stakeholder management — credible with SLT, clients and suppliers alike.
- Hands-on knowledge of print processes, materials, finishing and POS/retail production methods.
- Structured, process-minded, comfortable operating in a function under active redesign.
- People leadership skills, with experience managing and developing a production team.
- Genuinely commercial and growth-minded — able to see and articulate how production capability supports new business wins and organic client growth, not just delivery.
- Confident working with systems and data, with a genuine focus on maximising the use of AI to drive efficiency, insight and better decision-making across the production function.
Apply Now
- Excellent stakeholder management — credible with SLT, clients and suppliers alike.
- Hands-on knowledge of print processes, materials, finishing and POS/retail production methods.
- Structured, process-minded, comfortable operating in a function under active redesign.
- People leadership skills, with experience managing and developing a production team.
- Genuinely commercial and growth-minded — able to see and articulate how production capability supports new business wins and organic client growth, not just delivery.
- Confident working with systems and data, with a genuine focus on maximising the use of AI to drive efficiency, insight and better decision-making across the production function.
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