Virgin Games Appoints Rainey Kelly To£10m Task

Virgin Games, the online gambling portal, has handed Rainey Kelly Campbell Roalfe/Y&R its advertising business ahead of a £10m brand awareness push.

Virgin Games, which launched last year and is wholly owned by Virgin Group, offers casino, poker and skill-based games. It has run little advertising to date, except for a poster campaign in London backing its poker offering.

The company has briefed Rainey Kelly to develop outdoor and press work that will appear later this year.

"The market is very competitive, so we plan to increase our spend and our profile significantly from July," said Oscar Nieboer, managing director of Virgin Games. "A lot of people in the market are buying up the media well in advance and availability is limited, so we want to get in there early."

The increased activity will coincide with a relaunch of the Virgin Games website, as well as the introduction of a range of new products.

It also plans to increase its focus on poker. The game has become hugely popular in the UK, with US operators UltimateBet and Absolute Poker set to launch here later this year. Existing operators include PartyPoker and 888.com.

Manning Gottlieb OMD is handling Virgin Games' media planning and buying.