The Advertising Association promotes the role and rights of responsible advertising and its value to people, society, businesses and the economy. We represent UK advertisers, agencies, media owners and tech companies on behalf of the entire industry, acting as the connection between industry professionals and the politicians and policy-makers.

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The Advertising Association focuses on major industry and policy areas that have huge ramifications on UK advertising. This section contains our work around public health, gambling advertising, data and e-privacy, trust, the digital economy and more.

Credos is the advertising industry’s independent think tank. It produces research, evidence and reports into the impact and effectiveness of and public and political response to advertising on behalf of UK advertisers in order to enable the industry to make informed decisions.

Front Foot is our industry’s member network of over 90 businesses across UK advertising. It aims to promote the role of responsible advertising and its value to people, society and the economy through a coalition of senior leaders from advertisers, agencies and media owners.

We run a number of events throughout the year, from our annual LEAD summit to the Media Business Course and regular breakfast briefings for our members. We are also the official UK representative for the world’s biggest festival of creativity – Cannes Lions.

AA Responds to 2024 General Election Result

/ July 5th 2024
Advertising and the UK Economy Industry News

In response to the 2024 General Election result, the Advertising Association has issued the following statement.

Stephen Woodford, CEO, Advertising Association said:

“The Advertising Association congratulates the Rt Hon Sir Keir Starmer MP and the Labour Party on forming the next government. As one of the UK’s top growth industries and service exporters, we look forward to working with the Prime Minister and his Cabinet to help deliver sustainable growth across the UK’s nations and regions.

UK advertising is big business, a £36bn powerhouse industry which is growing year on year, delivering investment and jobs up and down the UK – from Bristol to Manchester, Leeds to Edinburgh. In 2023, our services exports grew 15% to reach £18bn across key markets in Europe, Asia, and North America, highlighting our world leading creativity.

Advertising plays an important societal role too. Recent examples of this include raising awareness of the need to register to vote, increasing vaccination uptake across hard-to-reach communities, raising awareness of mental health issues, encouraging behaviour changes around areas such as food waste reduction, and providing vital funding to culture, media and sport.

As we enter a new political landscape, creating the conditions for responsible, sustainable business growth is the top priority. The UK needs to remain at the forefront of the data-driven economy. Regulatory certainty and support for the Advertising Standards Authority is key, as well as reforming education and skills policies to ensure our industry has the best creative and digital talent for our continued success and to grow jobs and investment.”