The Brand Surgery - Branding, Graphic Design and Web Design in Worthing, West Sussex

Viking passengers experience 39 hours delay

I don’t know … I’ve been gone for two weeks and the blogging has just stopped. Luckily I came back when I did …

It is actually a major miracle that I made it back after my Egyptian adventures. Drift snorkelling isn’t for Vicky Vaughan. Especially when one’s face mask doesn’t fit. And double-especially when one is extremely short-sighted. Treble-especially when there are twenty identical looking boats which are 200 metres apart, with a strong current and you can’t remember the name of your boat. I have to say that my drift-snorkelling experience was pretty scary, and I am not sure if I still want to swim the channel to raise funds for my charity, Talent within You next year.

Bad Branding Experience

The swimming was just one adventure! The second was my delay coming home. We were delayed by 39 hours and 40 minutes no thanks to Viking Airlines. The worst part about our delay was that Viking couldn’t be bothered to communicate with its 200 passengers in person. They faxed a letter to Sharm airport to tell us the plane had been cancelled. I was travelling alone and if I hadn’t been so well travelled, would have been very frightened. To Viking’s credit, they did provide accommodation for two evenings. If they had of been honest and said we would be staying another two nights, we could of relaxed. Instead, they had us check-in and check-out of the hotel three times. We had four departure times conveyed to us via an Egyptian rep with pigeon English.

The above experience has left me with a bad memory and is what I call BAD branding! Viking should be sitting on the naughty step for a long time. They have broken their brand promise which is (according to their website): Our experienced team has a philosophy of excellent customer service to ensure your flight experience is exemplary.We look forward to being of service to you! LOL!

The last bad experience was with Breo watches. I purchased a Breo Roam watch on the outbound Viking flight, and it was supposed to be water resistant to 10m. Well trust me, Breo watches  are not water resistant. And what’s more, they will not give me my money back because I have no receipt, thanks to Viking Airlines! Answer from Breo to my request for a replacement or refund: Apologies for the experience with the watch. Unfortunately, In accordance with our Returns Policy (http://www.breo.com/customerservices.php) “Returns and exchanges will only be processed if accompanied with proof of purchase. This includes all airline purchases and items bought through resellers”. What an utterly useless response when Viking couldn’t even send a plane to take me home so I could get a receipt!

Good branding experience

Good branding though is the service I received from HSBC holiday insurance, which comes free with HSBC banking. They refunded £25 per 12 hours (OK a bit stingy I know), but they did it by BACs on the phone. It was so easy. Thank you.

So after all of this, I did have a great holiday. We stayed at Three Corners St. George in Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt. The weather was gorgeous. I had great company with my friends who I met at the hotel. I would go to Sharm El Sheikh again – it’s great to be able to trust the weather in March.

While I’ve been away sunning myself, my brand doctors and nurses have been busy working on three websites, brochures, rebrands and adverts. We are also writing a number of press releases for businesses on a national level. Plus the long awaited book, is back from the proof reader, and we are just about to send it to the publisher.  Go to www.doamadonna.com for a sneak preview! Watch this space!

Call Vicky at The Brand Surgery (best branding company in West Sussex) on 01903 824229 or email vicky@thebrandsurgery.co.uk if you would like to give your business some urgent branding medical attention.

Rebranded Coastliner buses are launched

As you may know, we publish the Coastliners Magazine on behalf of Stagecoach, with our sister company Pulse.

We always work hard to ensure the cover of the magazine will not date – especially as the Coastliners magazine has a shelf-life of six months. Although this magazine ran over Christmas, we didn’t want to make the cover too Christmassy as it had to last through to March 2010.

Hidden illustration talent

The boss – and original Brand Doctor, Vicky Vaughan, decided it was time to unveil her hidden illustration talents and created the above masterpiece! Wow! She illustrated the Spinnaker Tower in Portsmouth and The Brighton Dome, which represented the Coastliner route from end-to-end.  The added benefit of this illustrated cover design, was that the colours Vicky chose, followed the Stagecoach South corporate identity and  branding. The cover was presented to our client, approved, then printed and is actually still in circulation now.

Not long after the magazines were printed, we received a call from Stagecoach South, who were so impressed with Vicky’s illustrations, they commissioned her to illustrate six further landmarks across the south coast in the same style as she created for the cover.

Official launch of illustrations

Illustrations of landmarks along the Coastliners route

We’ve been keeping this work top secret at the request of our client, until now! At last, we have been given permission to tell the world about where the landmarks would appear. As you can see in the photo above, Vicky’s illustrations were part of a design for Coastliner buses.

There are 40 buses in total which will be wrapped in this unique design, and there are four different designs:

• Worthing
• Brighton
• Chichester
• Portsmouth

Vicky says: “I was so proud to see the illustrations in their finished format. The illustrations took a long time, especially the HMS Victory with all it’s ropes, and the Chichester Market Cross with all the fine detail. It was so worth it, so see my illustrations printed so large. I believe these buses will be cruising across from Brighton to Portsmouth for the next few years, and I certainly won’t mind being stuck behind one of the Coastliner buses in future!”

Illustrations can be used for a number of marketing solutions

Now we have unleashed this creative talent from Queen Vic, why not consider commissioning Vicky to do one for you. Illustrations are excellent for:

• Websites
• Brochures and leaflets
• Posters
• Newsletters and magazines
• Books
• Exhibition graphics
• Livery signage
• Packaging

Illustrations of landmarks along the Coastliners route