WPP

A London-headquartered communications group that owns many of the biggest advertising, media, PR and production agencies working in the UK.

About WPP

WPP is the holding company behind a large share of the advertising you see every day. It owns well-known agencies for advertising, media buying, public relations, branding and production, including Ogilvy, Grey, VML, Mindshare, Wavemaker and EssenceMediacom. Working at WPP usually means working in one of these agencies for clients that range from drinks and cars to banks and technology brands. WPP says its agencies operate in 112 countries and have worked for 348 of the Fortune Global 500, with named work for Coca-Cola, Google Pixel and Mazda. Its public relations brands include Hill+Knowlton Strategies and BCW, and its brand and production names include Landor and Hogarth.

The company has a long history. It began in 1971 as Wire and Plastic Products, a maker of wire shopping baskets, and in 1985 Martin Sorrell and Preston Rabl took control of it with the aim of building a worldwide marketing services group. It has grown by joining together many agencies since then, and in 2025 Cindy Rose became its chief executive. Through the late 1980s it bought agencies such as J. Walter Thompson, Hill & Knowlton and the Ogilvy Group, and it later bought Young & Rubicam. In 2018 Mark Read became chief executive and merged several agencies to reduce duplication. Wikipedia lists about 104,000 employees worldwide as at 2026. WPP calls itself "a creative transformation company" and says it uses creativity to build better futures for its people, clients and communities.

WPP is headquartered in London and listed on the London Stock Exchange. Campaign reported in November 2025 that about 3,000 people work at its refurbished One Southwark Bridge campus, roughly a third of its UK workforce, including around 200 developers on its AI marketing platform WPP Open. Ogilvy and VML are based at Sea Containers, Grey and Mindshare at Rose Court, and WPP also has a UK campus in Manchester. WPP says its agencies work with 69 FTSE 100 companies.

The campus is described as having a multi-faith room, a sensory room for neurodivergent colleagues, a parents' room and a wellness studio. WPP introduced a four-days-a-week office expectation at the start of 2025, so expect to be in with colleagues most of the week. Its chief executive called the campus "an engine for collaboration". Those are the company's own words, so ask current staff what day-to-day life is really like.

WPP employs people across many kinds of work: creative and design, strategy and planning, account management, media planning and buying, data and analytics, production, technology and engineering. Because it is a group of many agencies, the best way in is to pick the agency whose work and clients excite you, then look at that agency as well as at WPP itself. Entry routes are not covered here, so check each agency's own pages.

What they do

• {'desc': 'Campaigns and brand ideas made by agencies such as Ogilvy, Grey and VML.', 'title': 'Advertising and creative'}
• {'desc': 'Deciding where ads appear, through Mindshare, Wavemaker and EssenceMediacom.', 'title': 'Media planning and buying'}
• {'desc': 'Tools and data work, including the WPP Open AI marketing platform.', 'title': 'Data and technology'}

Key facts

• Began in 1971 as Wire and Plastic Products; Sorrell and Rabl took control in 1985 (Wikipedia)
• About 3,000 staff at One Southwark Bridge, a third of UK staff (Campaign, Nov 2025)
• Three London offices plus a Manchester campus (Campaign)
• Describes itself as a creative transformation company (LBB profile)

Website: www.wpp.com