Taylor Nelson Sofres announced on 24 April that it was bringing together operations in 53 countries under a single brand, with immediate effect. The rebranding means the company is now named simply ‘TNS’.

The old name was the result of a merger between the French research company Sofres and the British company Taylor Nelson at the end of 1997. Since then, the group has grown considerably through acquisition, with the number of offices growing from 25 in 1998 to 230 today. In total, more than 9000 people are employed across the 230 offices and TNS is now the third largest marketing information group in the world, with a turnover in 2002 of 977 million euros.

However, prior to the rebranding, more than 40 different brand names and corporate identities were still being used – along with several hundred brands of various subdivisions, products and separate research sectors.

The new TNS brand and pink marque has been developed by global brand consultancy Wolff Olins and is based on the idea of being ‘the sixth sense of business’, a slogan the company has trademarked. TNS Australian marketing manager Sian Braithwaite explains that the company wanted an unexpected colour, not a traditional corporate one.

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