Silverjet Chooses Special-Effect Coatings
New business class carrier, Silverjet, has chosen Akzo Nobel Aerospace Coatings (ANAC) and its unique Special-Effect Coatings to personify the design for the new livery on its fleet of Boeing 767s. Silverjet, based in London’s Luton airport in the United Kingdom, carries business class passengers to the United States. Silverjet tasked London-based strategic brand and marketing communications consultant, Strategic-Fusion, with the challenge of creating a striking design for its new fleet of aircraft.
Combining its experience with the airline industry and its strategic and creative ability, StrategicFusion designed a striking livery for Silverjet that required a distinctive and high-metallic silver finish. They were impressed by ANAC’s ability to respond quickly with large sample sheets of the effect they were trying to achieve. Using products from ANAC’s Mica Special Effect Coatings Range, ANAC’s Sales Manager, Steve Pickering, provided further samples of eight different subtle tones of the metallic silver, ranging from light to dark. These panels were provided within only four days by ANAC’s Leicester facility, using color formulations unique to Silverjet’s requirements.
“Steve Pickering was very helpful in working with us, getting involved in the very early stages of the project, developing samples with us and testing different color combinations,” commented Robert Cachia of StrategicFusion. “He even supplied our model makers with the exact paint we used on the plane, so that the end result was exactly the same as the prototype. Nothing was too much effort.”
The British airline, Silverjet, is aiming to become the global market leader in exclusive business class, ‘luxury’ long-haul air travel. Though only operating between London and New York initially, the company plans to add other long-distance destinations over the coming years.
ANAC’s support for the new airline continued after Silverjet approved the final design. ANAC’s Steve Pickering personally supervised the application of the coatings at Maas Aviation in Maastricht, Holland, ensuring the exact requirements of the designers (the complex fade scheme used for the Silverjet letters) were achieved. When the first fully coated Silverjet B767 was rolled out in December 2006, the company was more than delighted with the results. “We selected ANAC and Maas Aviation, trusting them to give us the results we expect,” explained Silverjet’s Technical Director, David Fleming. Stating that both companies would now be coating the rest of the fleet, Fleming said, “Silverjet’s policy is to give future business to those suppliers that helped us with the difficult process of introducing a new airline to the marketplace.”
ANAC recently launched its new range of Special-Effect coatings. Designers can now also select from mica-based paints offering ‘satin’, ‘crystal’, and ‘diamond’ effect finishes, in a wide range of colors, including metallic and iridescent. As in the case of Silverjet, special colors/effects to communicate specific corporate identities can be supplied quickly by ANAC through their customer-intimate support approach.
For more information, e-mail Marina Turion-Kahlmann at marina.turion@anac.com, or Laura Menze at laura.menze@anac.com, or visit www.anac.com.
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