Jeff Marchand is back in business as president of his own company, Priority:Media, in Toronto. He had been with Starcom Worldwide for 15 years when he resigned his post of SVP/GM of the Toronto office in 2005. During a hiatus spent traveling – and doing some project work – the media vet decided on a direction for the second part of his career.

Rather than setting up a buying and planning agency, Marchand is consulting directly with marketing departments to help them elevate their media product, their relevancy and the interest they take in media planning and buying.

‘What I’m selling is unbiased, unconnected expertise,’ he tells MiC. ‘Nowhere else in a marketing department do they leave $10 to 30 million completely to the discretion of an agency without having someone internally with the right expertise. They spend $300,000 a year on ad production, and hundreds of hours with an agency going over a script, going to shoots – and have an incredible interest in it, because it’s critical to their business. But they don’t spend any time training people to become engaged in the $30 million that’s going to show all that to the world.’

Since launching his company at the beginning of the year, Marchand has lined up four clients: Monster Canada out of Montreal, and in Toronto, Diageo, Frito-Lay and Woodbine Entertainment Group.