Pr companies toast merger

Two of Bristol's largest public relations agencies have mergedwith Strategy Communications having been bought for an undisclosedsum by Harrison Cowley.

The company will trade under the Harrison Cowley name with jointfee income of GBP1.5 million and an outstanding client portfolio andemploying 28 people.

Harrison Cowley's South West operation will be led by Ian Muir,founder of Strategy Communications.

He said: "This merger gives us the critical mass to furtherenhance our specialist business-to-business, consumer, property andpublic sector marketing support, creating a service offering that israrely found outside London."

Bristol, the city in which Harrison Cowley was founded in the1960s, will now be home to one of the strongest teams in the nationalHarrison Cowley group.

Harrison Cowley's new South West region client base will nowinclude Business West, the Bristol Alliance, Crest Nicholson, HaysPersonnel, Knight Frank, Land Securities, Land Rover, Lloyds TSB,Solomon Hare, and Westinghouse. No jobs will be lost.

Kwik Save sales lift SUPERMARKET group Somerfield reported a saleslift for its Kwik Save brand after showing signs of benefiting from astore refit programme.

The Bristol-based group, which acquired the business in 1998, saidlike-for-like sales at Kwik Save grew one per cent in the 24 weeks toApril 24, compared to a one per cent decline seen over the previous28 weeks.

At Somerfield-branded stores, like-for-like sales were 1.8 percent higher for the last half-year period, slightly down on the rateof 2.2per cent seen prior to that.

The boost comes after the group embarked on a major refurbishment.One-third of the group's 601 Somerfield stores have so far beensubject to refits, while around 70 Kwik Save shops out of 649 havebeen given a new look.

Unite are upbeat GEOFFREY Maddrell, chairman of Bristol-basedstudent accommodation provider the Unite Group has given an upbeatforecast for the future at its annual general meeting.

Mr Maddrell said first quarter performance was on track, with like-for-like reservations up 2.3 per cent and applications from thehigher education sector up 3.1 per cent. He said there was everyconfidence to build upon its position as the UK's leading provider ofstudent accommodation.

The firm, which expects to be providing more than 30,000 bedsprofitably within 18 months, is to develop and operate a 1,162-bed,GBP45 million student village in Sheffield with investment bankLehman Brothers.