PR boss takes over carrier bag firm for new reality show

From the Echo, first published Friday 17th Oct 2003.

WE'VE had house swap shows, even wife swap programmes.

Now prepare for Channel 4's latest show Boss Swap.

And PR boss Lee Peck is leading the way, having swapped his agency, Leepeckgreenfield, to take up the reins at Wimborne-based firm Decomatic.

In the past Lee's been a local TV reporter, then moved into entertainment, presenting Game For a Laugh in 1986, before setting up his own public relations firm in February 1988.

For the last two weeks he has been away from his Southampton-based agency, one of southern Britain's leaders in its field, which merged with Greenfield Computer Marketing three years ago.

The firm he has been running, Decomatic, is one of only three British producers and suppliers of carrier bags.

Currently on Decomatic's customer list are Harrods, who get the bags with their logo already stamped on, and the Rolling Stones, who are using Decomatic's products for their tour.

Father-of-four Lee, 50, must somehow improve Decomatic in five ways during his time there.

Lee said: "I have decided on some of the five changes and I have had new Decomatic signs made. The old ones were hopeless, they were old fashioned."

Lee, who describes Decomatic's products as "first class" said his other improvements to the company, some of which he saw as "essential", must remain under wraps until the show is screened in January 2004.

"Part of this programme as I see it is to make things happen so this is about change and imbuing a company with a new culture and making staff smile and be happy."

Agreeing that taking over a manufacturing firm was less of a tall order than Decomatic MD Bryan Dion was getting having to take on his role generating news and publicity at the PR firm, Lee said: "There is more of a process here, that's very fair."

At the PR firm, which he describes as a "small to medium-size company", Lee is in charge of 30 staff. At Decomatic he had only 16 to look after.

The show is being filmed, on commission from Channel 4, by RDF Media, the creators of Wife Swap and Scrap Heap Challenge.

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