Freud Communications

Freud Communications Limited is a public relations firm based in London. It was founded in 1985 by Matthew Freud. He is the great-grandson of the Austrian psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud, who himself was the uncle of Edward Bernays, the Austrian-American pioneer of public relations.

Freud Communications Limited
IndustryAdvertising
Public relations
Founded1985
HeadquartersLondon, United Kingdom
Key people
Matthew Freud
Products
  • Branding & identity
  • Consumer insights
  • Design
  • Digital
  • Marketing
  • Market research
  • Media planning and buying
  • Public relations
  • Relationship marketing
Number of employees
200 approx.
Websitefreuds.com

Overview

Freud Communications was bought in 1994 by another independent agency in the United Kingdom, Abbott Mead Vickers (AMV), for about £10 million, only for Matthew Freud together with other partners to buy back the company for a similar sum in 2001. That was when AMV was itself purchased by the US group Omnicom.[1][2] Freud Communications USA, which closed in February 2009, was based in New York City.[3]

In 1999 Leapman reported in The Times that Freud Communications had offered an Internet brand management service to its clients. This would "scour the Net for references to its clients" and if they were criticised, "the agency would use rebuttal tactics to minimise the potentially negative impact of online inaccuracy".[4] In 2007 PR Week ran a story documenting the use of WikiScanner to track anonymous edits and link them to organizations through their IP addresses; it found that "Freud Communications' London office was caught making Wikipedia edits on behalf of clients."[5][6]

In June 2005, the French Publicis Groupe (then the third largest communications firm in the world) acquired a 50.1% stake in Freud Communications.[7] In 2006, Freud purchased advertising agency DFGW. [8][9]

In 2011, Freud Communications had a turnover of around £40 million per year. It has a staff of more than two hundred and was ranked by PR Week in their ranking system as 6th in the UK.[10]

Clients

References
  1. Hopkins, Nic (2005) Matthew Freud, The Times, June 17, Friday p. 55
  2. Ford, Emily (2010) Freud may break away from Publicis, The Times Thursday November 25, Page 63.
  3. "HL Group absorbs Freud New York - Brand Republic News". Archived from the original on 2010-02-02. Retrieved 2009-02-14.
  4. Leapman, Michael (1999) Trade Digest The Times, June 11, Friday
  5. Tool draws attention to firms' Wikipedia edits, Shah, Aarti PR Week, 31 August 2007 (Accessed April 2013)
  6. Farsetta, Diane (4 September 2007). "Wikis Prove Tricky for PR Firms". PR Watch (Center for Media and Democracy). Retrieved 28 March 2011.
  7. JOURNAL, Aaron O. Patrick Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET (2005-06-17). "Publicis Agrees to Buy Freud Communications". Wall Street Journal. ISSN 0099-9660. Retrieved 2021-03-10.
  8. Sweney, Mark (2011) Matthew Freud to buy back PR agency for the second time, The Guardian, Sunday 13 March (Accessed April 2013)
  9. Andrews, Amanda (2011) Matthew Freud buys back his PR firm from Publicis, The Telegraph 15 Apr (Accessed April 2013)
  10. PR Week:Top-150-league-table 2011 (Accessed April 2013)
  11. "Terms of Reference - The Hamilton Commission". Royal Academy of Engineering. Project Forty Four Limited. 2020. Retrieved 27 January 2021.
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