Built for the long campaign
Wrap Marketing is a defence marketing agency for equipment manufacturers, technology companies and SMEs. Our clients sell to the Ministry of Defence, allied forces and the primes that lead major programmes. We help you be credible where reputation is everything and compliant where words carry weight. And we make you visible at the moments that decide long, layered procurements.
Trust is the first requirement
Defence is changing fast. The UK has committed to spend 2.6% of GDP on defence from April 2027 and 3.5% on core defence by 2035. The MOD also aims to grow its spend with UK SMEs by 50%, to £7.5 billion a year by May 2028. Allies across Europe are raising spending too. More suppliers are now competing for attention in a market that has never rewarded noise.
Defence buyers are expert, risk averse and bound by process. They buy capability, not features, through frameworks, primes and evaluation panels, and they remember who delivered in the field.
So defence marketing is less about reach and more about trust. That means evidence that stands up and language that respects the rules. It means a presence in the right places long before the requirement is written.
Long procurements, many hands
A defence requirement passes through many hands before anyone signs. Capability planners, programme teams, commercial and security specialists, a prime contractor and an evaluation panel may all have a say. Each has a different question, and most will research you long before they speak to you.
That shapes what defence marketing has to do:
- Be credible early, with case evidence, accreditations and technical detail that a sceptical engineer or procurement lead can check.
- Speak to the prime as well as the end user. For many SMEs, the route into a programme runs through a prime’s supply chain.
- Prove your wider value, from skills and local supply chains to the armed forces community.
- Be ready for the moments that matter: the industry days, the shows such as DSEI, and the tender windows on the Defence Sourcing Portal and Find a Tender that open and close quickly.
Field tested
Our defence experience comes through the machines that support it. From 2016 to 2019 we supported Caterpillar and the Finning dealer network in the defence market. The work covered competitive market research and sales support collateral. We also wrote case studies on safety in the field for the UK Ministry of Defence and the US Department of Defense.
We also helped align that work with Caterpillar’s corporate social responsibility and veteran community commitments. The brand showed up for the people as well as the procurement.
Today we work with Instagrid, whose portable power systems serve defence customers as well as construction sites.
See Finning
Careful with words
In defence, what you cannot say matters as much as what you can. Export controls, security classifications, customer approvals and the reputations of the people who use your equipment all shape the story.
We work within those limits rather than around them. We agree early what is public and get customer and prime approvals in place. Then we prove capability without exposing anything sensitive. Case studies that speak in outcomes, test data cleared for release and imagery that shows the product without showing the operation.
The result is marketing that a security officer can sign off and a buyer can believe.
Request a callQuestions from the ops room
It helps suppliers to the defence sector be found, trusted and chosen. That covers positioning, credible case evidence and compliant content. It covers campaigns aimed at programme teams and primes, show and exhibition content, and the story of your wider value. We plan all of it around long, framework led procurement rather than short campaigns.
Yes, and the MOD wants more of them to. It aims to grow its spend with UK SMEs by 50% by May 2028, directly and through primes. The SMEs that win usually make themselves easy to find, easy to understand and easy for a prime to include in a bid.
By agreeing early what is public and who has to approve it. Then we build the story around outcomes and capability rather than sensitive detail. We are used to customer approval processes and long sign off chains. We plan the timeline around them.
Yes. Stand content, product films, animation, interactive screens and the follow up that turns conversations into opportunities, working with specialist stand builders on the build.
Yes, and many of the best defence suppliers do. Dual use products need two stories that never contradict each other. One is for the construction site, the factory or the emergency service. The other is for the defence buyer, and each needs the right proof and the right level of detail. Instagrid's portable power serves both, and Caterpillar's machines work on civil sites and military bases alike. We keep the brand consistent and the claims appropriate for each audience.
The buying behaviour is familiar: technical products, long decisions and committees. What changes is the weight of trust and compliance, and the role of primes and frameworks. Our industrial roots help; the detail is what we learn for each client.
No. We start with a free discovery session and a scoped piece of work. Then we build a programme sized to the opportunity.
From capability to campaign
- Positioning and market research. Where you fit in the defence market, which programmes and primes matter and how competitors are positioned, built on competitive research rather than assumption.
- Credible content and sales support. Case studies, capability statements, product films and sales collateral that a technical buyer can check and a prime can include in a bid.
- Targeted visibility. Search, AI visibility and LinkedIn programmes aimed at programme teams, procurement and prime supply chain managers, landing on a website built for scrutiny.
- Social value and community. Turning your commitments to veterans, skills and local communities into evidence an evaluation panel or a prime can use.
Your wider value counts
Public buyers increasingly weigh what a supplier contributes beyond the contract. Across most central government contracts, social value now carries a minimum 10% weighting. Defence and security contracts sit outside that rule. But the primes that bid for public work still need supply chains that help them show it.
Many defence suppliers already support veteran employment, apprenticeships, local supply chains and the armed forces community. Few evidence it well. We help you measure it, prove it and tell it in a way that counts.
Our article on social value in procurement goes deeper.
Other sectors we work in
Defence suppliers rarely sell into one market. The same equipment, technology and engineering often serve construction, industry and infrastructure too:
- Heavy equipment and plant hire: OEMs, dealer networks and the hire and rental companies that keep fleets working.
- Construction and building materials: contractors and the building product manufacturers that supply them.
- Advanced manufacturing and engineering: automation, Industry 4.0 and technical brands whose buyers check the maths before the brochure.
- Fintech: banking infrastructure, payments and regtech that has to make complexity look simple.
- Sustainability and ESG: credible sustainability and social value stories, in every sector we work in.