Media: A moment with Marquis.(Alastair Gornall services)

I visited my old associate Alastair Gornall, the chief executive of Reed Exhibitions, in Richmond the other day. He proudly showed me its new offices. No more than 50 paces across the road from the old building, the contrast could not have been greater.

Light and airy, spacious, cool, reeking of new paint and carpet, and every spanking new workstation had a brand new flat-screen monitor and a properly designed chair. The cupboards had sloping tops (so no-one can pile papers); there were no kettles - near-boiling water comes out of a special tap in the kitchen; there are snug meeting rooms and quiet spaces to think in. The new offices were uplifting. They made you feel like settling down to work to dream up great ideas. The old ones were - well, old. Tired, dreary, cluttered. Gornall was pleased as punch at the new atmosphere, the new culture he now presided over. He was certain it would reinvigorate his people.

How very true. I left Zenith-Optimedia just before its move to Percy Street. I spent eight years in Paddington, one of media's more eccentric office spaces. Not unpleasant exactly, but hardly the height of style and modernity. When I was trying to glue Zenith and Optimedia together a few years ago, I believed a new building was the most important thing we could do to make the company feel brand new. ...