Malta news: New brand identity

Air Malta yesterday unveiled its new brand identity as part of a €1.9 million investment to revamp its corporate vision, a key aspect of the company’s restructuring plan intended to make it profitable by 2015. Speaking in the presence of Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi at a news conference following a business breakfast at the Mediterranean Conference Centre in Valletta yesterday, company CEO Peter Davies said that preliminary results for the first quarter of this financial year indicate that the company is in line with the ambitious financial targets listed in the restructuring programme. According to this plan, Air Malta has to reduce losses to €15 million by the end of this financial year. He said that following the first year of the implementation of this plan, there was a €4 million improvement in the airline’s annual deficit which however still totalled €29.3 million. He explained that in June last year when the new board took over the management of the airline, for each euro entering the company’s coffers, €1.25 were being spent. However spending has been brought down to €1.14 in the financial year which ended last March and will continue to decrease until the company breaks even in 2014, and hopefully makes some profit in three years’ time. Mr Davies refused to comment on the purchase of the RJ Avroliners in the 1990s which is often cited as one of the main reasons leading to the financial meltdown of the company, even though the government has consistently denied this claim. On the other hand the airline’s chairman, Louis Farrugia, was more cautious stating that there is still a long way ahead before success can be claimed. Meanwhile the Airline Pilots Association (ALPA) last Saturday urged the company employees to boycott the activities related to the launch of the company’s new brand identity, stating that this was never mentioned in the steering committee which had overseen the drafting of the restructuring plan. The activities started on Monday with a presentation for the company employees who according to Air Malta’s CEO are very enthusiastic about this new brand strategy. With reference to ALPA’s directives Mr Davies tried to play down the whole issue, referring several times to the “productive conversations” held with the pilots while claiming that contrary to what their union has been saying the majority of its members have expressed themselves in favour of this rebranding exercise. He also stated that this process was given the green light by the European Commission. World renowned FutureBrand of London, the official marketing services provider for the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games was commissioned by Air Malta to design the new logo, which is very eye catching and highly reminiscent of the style used by Caribbean airlines due to its mix of bright colours. Another notable change is that the airline’s name will not be displayed in full, there will be simply the word ‘Malta’.(independent.com.mt) Air Malta is a very important structure for the island of Malta, we must take great care.