It sounds simple, but creating a new identity for Flight Group - unveiled here at the show - proved anything but easy for the team that has spent the last six months working on it.
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| Brand new: From left: Kevin O'Toole, Kieran Daly and Jim Muttram ready for today's launch |
The organisation is now branded simply Flight, the URL is www.flightglobal.com, and the only brands under that are the individual magazine, web, data and event products.
You can see the difficulty - Flight's market-leading growth in electronic products in recent years had resulted in the classic alphabetti-spaghetti mix of divisions, brands, and sub-brands that anyone in the aerospace industry knows only too well.
"It was a nice problem to have because it reflected our success, but there is no question it was confusing for the market, and our plans for future expansion were going to make things worse. So we had to do something about it," says Flight publishing director Jim Muttram.
At the same time Flight was in the process of developing its website into what is now by far the biggest aerospace website produced by any business-to-business publisher.
In fact the website itself, launched yesterday, provided an elegant way of grouping the products into a hierarchy that customers could easily understand - as you will see when you visit it.
The top level is the “global” section that gives free, searchable access to all the current and archived contents of Flight International, Airline Business and Flight Daily News. A major picture library will soon join that.
Then there is the “professional” section for more in-depth material that currently contains primarily directory content, but will soon include a range of privileged access content for registered users.
And finally Flight's premium products are in the “expert” section, requiring paid subscriptions for ultra-detailed data and real-time news. Those include Air Transport Intelligence, and the former AvSoft products ACAS, HeliCAS, MiliCAS, AVSiS, and RotorMart.
Muttram says: "We think the Flight name and new logo reflect the simplified organisational and product structure that will serve us well for many years to come. Aerospace and air transport are complicated businesses, but it's part of our job to cut through the complexity.
"Come and visit www.flightglobal.com and tell us what you think."
Visit the Flight stand, Hall A, 401.
Source: Flight Daily News
