Leslie Butterfield CBE
Leslie Paul Butterfield
Early Life Leslie Paul Butterfield was born in Reading, Berkshire (UK) on 31st August 1952 to Leslie John Butterfield, an engineer by training, and Ruth Maria Andräs, formerly a nurse. He lived in Newbury, Berkshire until aged 18, attending St. Bartholomew’s Grammar School.
Graduated from North East London Polytechnic (now University of East London) in 1974 with a BA (Hons) 1st class in Business Studies. Graduated from Lancaster University in 1975 with an MA Marketing (with Distinction).
Early career
Joined the fledgling advertising agency, Boase Massimi Pollitt in October 1975 as a trainee Account Planner. At this time, BMP was one of only two agencies in London embracing the Account Planning discipline. Noteworthy campaigns worked on included Tic Tac and Courage Breweries. Promoted to Associate Director in 1979.
Joined start-up agency Abbott Mead Vickers as Planning Director in April 1980. Worked on a number of pitches and key accounts, including Smiths crisps, Yellow Pages, Sainsbury’s, Volvo and BT. Established a full Account Planning function in the agency. AMV floated on the UK stock market in 1985.
Chair of the UK’s Account Planning Group in 1984–5. Chair of the Institute of Practitioners in Advertising’s Education and Training Committee from 1986 to 1989. Made a Fellow of the IPA in 1989.
Butterfield Day Devito Hockney
Butterfield started this agency in March 1987 with three partners. Initially he was Planning Director, later Chairman. The company grew to become a Top 20 UK advertising agency by 2003, securing clients such as Honda, BT, The Cooperative Bank, Harley Davidson, the Labour Party and Mercedes-Benz. In 1999 the agency was sold to Snyder Communications, who in turn were acquired by Havas Groupe in 2000. BDDH was ultimately folded into Havas’ Euro RSCG network in 2003.
During this period, Butterfield also edited, contributed to and published two books about best practice in advertising: 'Excellence in Advertising' and 'AdValue. 20 ways advertising works for business’.
Political involvement and work
Butterfield became involved in work for the UK Labour Party in 1985, when he was introduced by BMP’s CEO, Sir Chris Powell, to Labour’s ‘Breakfast Group’ (chaired by Peter Mandelson). For that group, he conducted a major piece of qualitative research (titled ‘Society and Self’) to evaluate the impact of Margaret Thatcher’s policies on voting intentions, and how Labour might respond to this. In his book, ‘The Unfinished Revolution’, Philip Gould (later Baron Gould of Brookwood) described this as “the single most influential piece of research ever conducted for Labour”. Butterfield conducted another major piece of research after the 1992 election, concluding that a much deeper re-assessment of Labour’s offer to the electorate was necessary. He undertook further research, and advised on Labour’s communications with the electorate, for each of the next three elections, all won by Tony Blair.
Early Brand Consultancy roles
Butterfield left BDDH at the beginning of 2001 to pursue a career now increasingly focused on brand and communications consultancy, rather than purely advertising. His first venture, Butterfield8, was a new consultancy concept that included himself plus seven partners from brand-related disciplines. Significant projects were secured from the Cooperative Group, BT, Mercedes-Benz and the TUC.
Butterfield8 was sold to The Ingram Partnership in 2003 and Butterfield joined TIP as a partner. The partners’ relationships with Chris Ingram were never entirely happy and, in 2006, Ingram decided to close the business and release all partners from their contracts. Major projects for Mercedes-Benz and British Airways were completed in this period.
Butterfield briefly ran a new consultancy, Butterfield Partners, in 2007–8 – working with Alliance & Leicester (Santander), Bupa, the Cabinet Office and the Liberal Democrats – before joining Interbrand in November 2008.
In 2005, Butterfield published 'Enduring Passion. The Story of the Mercedes-Benz Brand’, the culmination of a two-year research and writing project to capture the essence of one of the world’s most powerful and valuable brands. The foreword was written by Giorgio Armani, a lifelong fan of the Mercedes-Benz brand.
CBE
In recognition of his services to the Advertising Industry, Butterfield was made a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in the Queen’s 2007 Birthday Honours list.
Interbrand
Butterfield joined Interbrand (the world’s leading brand consultancy) in 2008 as Global Chief Strategy Officer and was later promoted to the Executive Leadership team of the company. His role was to unite a global group of 34 offices behind a single portfolio of strategic and creative tools – and a new set of quality standards. To that end, he developed a Brand Strategy toolbox and instituted a global ‘Interbrand Academy’ as a structured professional development programme for employees. Based in London from 2008–12, he moved to Shanghai with his family from 2013–15.
Recent career
On returning to the UK in 2015, Butterfield and his partner, Penny Harris, left their corporate roles in London to start their own new brand consultancy business - Butterfield Harris – based in the Cotswolds. The business grew rapidly with multiple assignments from the UK Government and projects for Jaguar Land Rover, The Children’s Society and Aon.
In parallel, Butterfield became involved as an investor and adviser in the recipe box brand Mindful Chef from 2015 until its majority sale to Nestle in 2020, and from 2020 in the Berlin-based vegan cakes and desserts brand, Von Georgia and the baby clothing rental brand, Bundlee. He also acted as non-executive Chairman of the Manchester-based research company Join the Dots Ltd.from 2017 until its sale to InSites Consulting in 2019.
Personal Life
Butterfield was married to Judy Mary Tombleson in 1988. They separated (and later divorced) in 2003. He has lived with his partner, Penny (Penelope) Gillian Harris, since 2000 and they have two children: Alexa Rose Butterfield (b. 2006) and Cerian James Harrison Butterfield (b. 2009). Outside of work he enjoys cars, railway archeology, music, travel, skiing and cocktails.
Books
'Excellence in Advertising. The IPA Guide to Best Practice'.; First edition 1997. Second Edition 1999; Butterworth Heinemann
'AdValue. Twenty ways Advertising works for Business'.; 2003; Butterworth Heinemann
'Enduring Passion. The Story of the Mercedes-Benz Brand'; 2005; Wiley'
References
‘Truth, lies and the hard sell.’; The Guardian; 22nd April 1995
‘Perfectionist planner keeps BT at Butterfield Day.’; Campaign magazine; 8th March 1996
- ‘Campaign’ magazine/Agencies report; 21st February 2003
- ‘The Unfinished Revolution. How the Modernisers saved the Labour Party.’; 1998; Philip Gould; Little, Brown & Co.
External links:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/lpbutterfield/?originalSubdomain=uk
https://butterfieldharris.co.uk/
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