REL Field Marketing

Sector

Professional Services

Location:

Winnersh

Established in

1995

Employees

728

Website

https://www.relfm.com

About us

The first question people ask us is “What is Field Marketing?”. What we do is represent some of the most amazing UK & Global brands in the field.

“The field” is the universe of places where brands may be on sale or can be interacted with by shoppers e.g. grocery & convenience stores, DIY & specialists, cash & carries, events & shows etc.

We work with amazing brands including Red Bull, Danone Waters, Mondeléz, GSK, Weetabix, Tetley, Sainsbury’s, Panasonic, Whirlpool, Dell, Bosch & Roberts Radio to name but a few.

Our people represent these brands in the field, spending their time with retailers & consumers helping grow their presence & sales at the point of purchase.

Our teams work to deliver Return on Investment for our partners by doing things like improving on-shelf availability, building distribution of new products, developing advocacy for the brands, delivering training to both retailers & consumers, sampling products & carrying out demonstrations.

Our business is all about people; we don’t manufacture anything other than the great teams so we try really hard to make REL an amazing place to work & more like a family than an employer.

Excellence in Wellbeing 2020

Excellence in Wellbeing 2018

UK's Best Workplaces 2017 - Large category (500+ employees)

Rank 13

UK's Best Workplaces 2016 - Medium category (50-499 employees)

Rank 36

UK's Best Workplaces 2015 - Large category (500+ employees)

Rank 5

What employees say

REL is, without doubt, the best place that I have ever had the privilege of being part of. Everyone throughout the company have an amazing attitude, which makes going to work a pleasure! The culture in the workplace is exceptional and rare. The management team are encouraging & supportive in everything you do, and this inspires me to excel at my job, go the extra mile & develop my career further. I feel appreciated & valued every day & part of a family, not just a company.

Hattie Drinkwater

Account Executive

97 %

This is a friendly place to work.

92 %

I am treated as a full member here regardless of my position.

93 %

People care about each other here.

92 %

I can be myself around here.

92 %

There is a "family" or "team" feeling here.

91 %

I'm proud to tell others I work here.

What defines us

The one thing more than any other that differntiates REL is our People Promise; it’s our cultural commitment, developed by our people, for all of our people! It is the beating heart of everything we do & guides how we all work together & behave. Whilst we believe its incredibly powerful, it’s not rocket science but helps to create and guide our great culture.

We all spend a lot of time at work & the philosophy of our promise is to create a culture that allows us to enjoy that time, have fun, enable & deliver success & crucially give all our people a voice.

The People Promise is the mechanism which drives us towards the first part of our vision of being 'loved by our people' & in applying its principles we have introduced countless colleague friendly initiatives including perks programmes, enhanced pension contributions, maternity & paternity leave, sabbatical leave & colleague listening programmes.

What inspires us

Lots of things inspire us here at REL, from the amazing recognition programmes we have at every level to the way in which there is no sense of hierarchy within the agency & that anyone in our family can talk to the MD or any member of the leadership team at any time, no appointment required!

Probably the area that inspires us most is seeing the personal growth of our people through our focus on coaching & career development.

In the past twelve months alone more than 40 of our people have been promoted within the agency or directly into one of our customer's businesses; as succession planning for the brands we represent is an initiative that REL have actively pursued over the years & for a number of our customers REL is their primary source of talent.

Though like any business we don’t like to lose talent we don’t see growing our colleagues' careers within our partners as a loss; we are helping our colleagues, our customers & ultimately ourselves as our ability to recruit new talent is enhanced by the numerous career paths that we can offer within our agency.

At a glance

Age of employees

Years with company

Gender ratio

Fulltime / Parttime

Action highlights

We believe that only by putting our people at the centre of our approach can we truly build an exceptional culture. We are continuously implementing new initiatives (many of which come directly from our people) through our ‘We’re Listening’ programme, that enhance and support our overall vision, mission and values, which are communicated widely and frequently across the organisation:

Vision - Loved by our people and first choice for customers

Mission - Inspiring our people to deliver results, value and insight that our partners cant get anywhere else.

Our Values - Customer comes first, care for our colleagues, be brilliant in all that we do

Our set of cultural commitments “The People Promise” defines the way we all work together and clearly sets out what is expected of all our family members!

Our business is all about people, we don’t manufacture anything other than the great teams we create and deploy for our partners so we try really hard to make REL an amazing place to work and more like a family than an employer.

We continue to focus heavily on the things that we believe make REL different, so we are clear about our strengths and that the primary differentiator for us is very clearly our people-focused culture. Put simply we try every day to create an environment where people come to work because they want to not because they have to!

Word from the top

I am hugely proud of our family here at REL & also what they achieve for our partners every day. Whether those achievements are on the front line, winning in store & increasing or influencing sales at the point of purchase, or whether it is one of the head office teams at Winnersh who support & enable our field teams to do their stuff. Our collective team deliver outstanding return for our customers.

I believe our success has come from the one thing that I am most proud of here at REL which is our the culture; I truly believe that it is our focus on building trust & engagement with our people that has delivered our success, enabling & empowering our people to make things happen for our customers & to care for each other.

Stephen Gordon

Managing Director

Career and jobs

Application tips

REL employs over 600 people nationally, working on behalf of our customers either on a full or part-time basis. Most of our roles are field-based with our colleagues visiting stores & locations where our customers' products are on sale.

At our Head Office in Winnersh, a team of around 80 central service colleagues support our field teams with IT, finance, HR, payroll, account management & administration services.

In addition to all these permanently employed roles, we offer numerous flexible working opportunities nationwide for those people who wish to work only when it suits them. These roles are ideal for students & those who wish to work on an ad-hoc basis or perhaps for those who wish to supplement their primary earnings with a second income stream.

For most of our front line field sales & marketing roles experience is not required as we provide bags of initial training & ongoing coaching. What we look for more than anything else is a positive “can do” attitude & strong communication skills.

If you bring those two attributes then we can provide everything else you will need to succeed & grow in the world of field sales & beyond!

Our great workplace

REL offers multiple avenues of progression, not only within whichever of our customer team’s that you initially join but also within REL as a whole; within our customers & across the Advantage Smollan group of companies. Not many employers can offer so many career paths.

For most of our field-based roles you will almost certainly need a driving license or means of getting to & from the store you work in.

If you are looking for a career with an agency with a great culture & a sense of family then REL may well suit you.

Unlike our partners, who manufacture anything and everything from chocolate & energy drinks to cameras & computers, our only product is our people so we work really hard to ensure that our colleagues love working for us, that’s what our People Promise is all about!

We think it’s a bit of a “no brainer” & that if we create the right environment; empowering, trusting, listening to & valuing our people then they will go the extra mile delivering success for us & our partners & that our people will fuel the future success of both REL & our customers.

In our culture we truly believe that people are the difference.