The Polish Influence

You may have many things to say about the expansion of the European Union and its implications for the British economy. Whether good, bad or indifferent, the truth is, is that Poles and their influx into the UK is something that advertisers and agencies alike will need to consider when deciding the best way to distribute their marketing £’s.

By sheer number, this audience are growing in economic significance - FACT. In 2010, nearly 20,000 babies were born to Polish mothers – that’s more than 50 a day. That’s more babies born a day – than there are people in my extended family (and I am Indian to boot!). Since 2005 – that has increased by more than 600%. Some statistic right?

The future of Britain is becoming less and less an Anglo Saxon one – especially when considering that one in four babies born a day are born to overseas mothers. Maybe one day we’ll become as multi lingual as our European counterparts – although I doubt it….  Whole Polish areas are beginning to spring up on my doorstep – I walk through Acton, Ealing, Hammersmith and Slough and I find Poles everywhere.

Let me roll out a few more statistics for you just to underline the strength of this migrant movement.

- Since 2004, up to 850,000 Poles have been granted a National Insurance number - needed to get work

- Five years ago, just 220 students sat a Polish GCSE - last year, the figure was 1,900

Probably the most interesting figure to leave you with is this.

- 40,000 Polish businesses opened from 2007 onwards

The Polish influence is increasing …….

Karen Needham

Looking Ahead

Looking out of the office window this morning, I took a moment to watch the ducks and swans gracefully go by. They were all going upstream and looking carefully below the surface I could see that they were paddling like mad. This was very similar to the last few months at Indoor Media, while from above everything looked calm, from below everyone has been working away like mad. I would like to say Thank You to our clients, publishers and partners as well as everyone at Indoor Media for their hard work and effort. Today we are proud to announce that we, as of now, will be part of Komli Media

The whole Indoor Media team are really excited by this and believe that this partnership will allow us to further meet the needs of our clients and provide a more comprehensive product offering. Komli Media are, Asia Pacific’s leading digital media network platform and together we will be the leader in offering ethnic marketing solutions for Asian audiences in the four largest English speaking economies in the western world – Australia, Canada, United Kingdom, and the United States.

So we in the offices (both here in London and the international Komli offices) are celebrating this momentous occasion and the start of a very successful partnership. For more information please read our press release

MURLY TIWARI

What's Fufu?

I came across some really interesting video clips on the Internet the other day and they have also been shown on TV, it was a mini-series called Raw Cuts which was a 4talent/NSPCC competition where teenagers could create a short video to have aired on Channel 4. The first What’s Fufu? Was an animated short narrated by a teenager describing what she went through being adopted into a White British family and trying to find her Nigerian cultural identity. The second is called Home Country where a teenager talks about acceptance of his heritage and culture regardless of the opinions of others.

This just goes to show that young people today, even though they can be lumped together as being very similar, (especially in the media); cultural heritage and a sense of belonging is important to the majority and is hardly ever forgotten. Click on the links to watch.

NATALIE KING

World Cup time again

So it's kicked off... 4 weeks, 64 games, 32 of the world's best teams and one gleaming golden Jules Rimet trophy.  Expectations are high amongst every nation hoping that maybe, just maybe, this will be the year that they win the World Cup.  In the case of the England fans, add a second star to that lonely little star that sits just above the England badge.

If you've seen Sky's World Cup ads, you'll know that they have the strapline about "50million England fans" supporting them.  Incidentally Sky aren't showing any matches, so why exactly are they advertising?  National pride, or just another corporate jumping on the bandwagon.  Anyway the point I wanted to make is that if there are 50 million England fans, who are the rest of the UK supporting?  If you take out the 3million Welsh, 5.5million Scots and 2million Northern Irish, there's still around 10million people who aren't following England. Having sat in Wembley stadium a couple of weeks ago for the England v Mexico friendly, I couldn't help notice the sheer volume of Mexicans attending the match.  Now I've never met a Mexican in London, but here they were, around 5,000 of them.  Similarly when Brazil play their annual fixture at the Emirates Stadium (In London to the uninitiated), they fill the entire 60,000 seater stadium.  The truth is that there are representatives of 189 of the 192 United Nation member countries living in London, and most of these are not  flying the St Georges Cross on their cars. If World Cups were awarded to the most multi cultural country, we'd have at least 5 stars.

JAY "INDIAN BUT ENGLAND FAN" RAI

Come on England!!

Well....this afternoon most men (and some women!) in the UK will be trying to sneak a peek at the opening game between South Africa and Mexico.  Although the many nationalities living here favour their team, this sport galvanizes not just generations but different races too.  As we celebrate the “beautiful game” we should celebrate the multicultural diversity that makes it a fantastic spectacle.  But, if you will, allow me to be a bit partisan – COME ON ENGLAND!

KAREN "ENGLAND TILL I DIE" NEEDHAM