Immediate Media Co, announces three major appointments to its Leadership team, significantly strengthening its strategic and e-commerce expertise.

Alison Forrestal is appointed Group Managing Director; responsible for driving digital growth, innovation and strategic development across a portfolio of Immediate’s market leading brands, including cycling, weddings and gardening, as well its advertising sales groups.

With a proven background in customer engagement and new product development, Alison previously headed-up retail and partnership operations for Media at Amazon. Prior to this, Alison successfully ran a number

of businesses for multi-national beverage producer Diageo, in Russia, America and Australia. 

Katy Gotch takes up the new role of Director of Business Development, with a remit to develop Immediate’s M&A strategy, in addition to new product development and incremental revenue growth strategies across the business.

With 20 years senior management and consulting experience, Katy has worked with some of the UK’s leading multi-channel retailers, including Dixons, Boots, EE and Homebase. Katy was Director of Group Strategy at the Home Retail Group, where she initiated and drove the development of the partnership between Sainsbury’s and Argos which ultimately led to the £1.2bn take-over of Argos. Most recently she was Director of Strategy and Customer Experience at Sainsbury’s Argos.

Andrew Gabriel joins as Group Managing Director for Immediate TV, overseeing Immediate’s TV Shopping channels, Jewellery Maker and Sewing Quarter.

Andrew has 25 years’ senior experience in marketing, e-commerce, purchasing and growth development for large international multi-channel retail, private equity and start-up businesses. Prior to joining Immediate Andrew was MD of TV shopping channel Ideal World, which was sold to Blackstone Private Equity in 2015.  Andrew has also held senior positions at Staples Europe and Dixons.

Immediate Media CEO, Tom Bureau, says: “As we enter the next stage of the Immediate journey, we are focused on growth through M&A and developing our existing digital and e-commerce businesses, on top of our amazing print engine. The appointments of Alison, Katy and Andrew bolster our strategic, M&A and e-commerce expertise. They bring a wealth of experience of identifying and delivering new business opportunities to drive growth across multiple platforms, and further strengthen our already talented leadership team.”