Creative media agency ALT is expanding beyond its Glasgow base with a new Manchester office, adding two senior hires as it builds a second operating centre and prepares for further recruitment in the city.
The agency has opened the office at No.1 St Michael’s in central Manchester, with founders and managing partners David and Laura Haggerty heading the location.
ALT was founded in 2019 and now employs 25 people. Its client roster includes UEFA and Whyte & Mackay, with the Manchester move extending a business previously centred on Glasgow.
The expansion follows the installation of a new leadership team in May. ALT’s board includes managing director Tala Cook, creative media director Nathan White, and campaigns director Fiona Hayes.
Two further senior appointments will support the Manchester operation. Martin Roberts has joined as business director and will lead day-to-day activity in the city, while Shivani Kulshrestha has been appointed strategy and planning director.
Roberts previously spent ten years at Dentsu, ultimately becoming UK head of programmatic. He has also founded Mediaworx and held senior roles at advertising technology businesses including SoSquared and Adform.
Kulshrestha joins from Green Park and has worked on digital and integrated strategy for brands including adidas, Meta, Spotify, Audi, Starbucks, Glenmorangie, and Tesco Mobile. Her earlier agency experience includes John Doe and We Are Social.
The existing Glasgow team will initially support planning and campaign delivery for the new office. ALT said a further Manchester recruitment round will open shortly.
David Haggerty said: “With ALT going from strength to strength in Glasgow, expanding to Manchester just made sense.”
The move places the agency inside one of the UK’s largest media and creative clusters. Manchester has attracted broadcasters, production businesses, agencies, technology companies, and brand teams, creating a labour market that can support specialist media and advertising roles outside London.
For an independent agency, opening a second office changes recruitment, management, client servicing, culture, and the way work is distributed between teams. Expansion can broaden the available talent pool and place the business closer to clients, but it also introduces additional fixed costs and the risk of creating parallel operations.
ALT’s initial model limits some of that exposure by using its Glasgow operation to support delivery while the Manchester team develops. That allows the new office to focus on senior commercial, planning, and strategic capacity before a larger local workforce is recruited.
The profile of the two hires also reflects changes in media buying. Roberts brings programmatic and advertising-technology experience, while Kulshrestha’s background spans digital-first brand strategy and integrated campaigns.
Agencies increasingly need to connect creative planning with fragmented media channels rather than treating strategy and buying as separate disciplines. Brand spending is distributed across social platforms, connected television, digital audio, outdoor media, search, and other channels, increasing the complexity of campaign planning.
That fragmentation is central to ALT’s commercial proposition. The agency’s stated model places audience-led creative insight within media planning, an approach intended to connect the campaign idea more closely with where attention is actually available.
Regional expansion can also become a route to new clients. A physical Manchester presence gives ALT closer access to businesses and agency partners across the North of England while retaining its established Scottish operation.
The management challenge will be preserving a consistent operating model across the two cities. Independent agencies often build their culture around close founder involvement, which becomes harder to maintain as teams expand geographically.
The next hiring round will indicate how quickly ALT intends to build permanent delivery capability in Manchester. Its initial structure combines senior local leadership with operational support from Glasgow, allowing the business to develop demand before duplicating more of its existing team.
If recruitment follows, the Manchester opening will mark a transition from a single-office independent agency to a multi-city operation — broadening market reach while adding another layer of management and delivery complexity.
You must be logged in to post a comment.