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Cheryl Hunter (shelflife at marklives.com)’s weekly pick of all things new — product, packaging, design, insight, food, décor and more!

  • Cathay Pacific Group rebrands Dragonair
  • A new-look Nutriday on shelf
  • Montblanc — keeping time with change

A new Dragonair for China

In a time of massive upheaval for airlines, The Cathay Pacific Group has announced that its wholly owned sister airline company, Dragonair, is to be rebranded as Cathay Dragon.

Explains Rakesh Raicar, country manager for Cathay Pacific Southern Africa and Indian Ocean, “Merging the two brand names and rebranding Cathay Dragon will capitalise on Cathay Pacific’s high international brand recognition and leverage on Cathay Dragon’s unique connectivity into Mainland China — one of the world’s fastest-growing business and leisure travel markets.”

This growth has been made possible by the Cathay Pacific Group’s efforts to channel international passengers to and from Mainland China, regional and long-haul markets through Hong Kong International Airport. The two will remain separate airlines, operating under their own licences.

Raicar says, “Cathay Dragon is a brand that will be instantly recognised as part of the Cathay Pacific Group, and will incorporate the same level of service, trust and hospitality known to existing passengers. This rebranding will sharpen our competitive edge by offering an attractive Cathay-led brand package that carries the assurance of a consistently high-quality customer experience.”

The rebranding will see new livery that features a Cathay-style brushwing logo created for Cathay Dragon. This will appear for the first time on one of Cathay Dragon’s Airbus A330-300 aircraft in April 2016, and will be progressively introduced to the rest of the airline’s fleet.

The Cathay Pacific Group plans a major international advertising and marketing campaign later this year to promote recognition of Cathay Dragon.

Since Dragonair became a solely owned subsidiary of Cathay Pacific in 2006, it has added 23 new destinations, and the number of passengers travelling across both carriers grew five times to more than 7m in 2015. The combined annual passenger numbers of the two airlines grew from 22m to more than 34m last year.

www.cathaypacific.comFacebookTwitter

 

Danone refreshes Nutriday

Fresh dairy product company, Danone, has transformed its yoghurt NutriDay, both inside and out, with a new recipe and pack sizes in order to secure its place on supermarket shelves. Thomas Morf, marketing director of Danone Southern Africa, spoke to Shelf Life about the process.

“NutriDay is the market leader in the yoghurt category. We wanted to ensure we’re always ahead of the game and to take ownership as the market leader, so we conducted multiple research studies and consumer collaboration sessions, to ensure our consumers get exactly what they want.”

Morillas, a creative artwork agency based in Spain, came on board and explored different, superior printing suppliers for more premium, glossy-looking packaging.

“We worked on a brand-range architecture to ensure the entire NutriDay range looks like a family, from Smooth to Plain to Fruit. We wanted our yoghurt to be more appetising, with real product images. NutriDay also wanted to shake things up in the category, so we decided to look at different cup sizes to make sure we stand out from the crowd.”

The NutriDay recipe has not changed significantly since launching into South Africa, but Morf says a deficiency was spotted in the market for vitamins and consumers looking for a thicker, creamier yoghurt: “We wanted to make sure we’re the best yoghurt for consumers. Now we can officially say we have the tastiest yoghurt offering on shelf. We can also claim that we’re a Smart Snack as a source of Vitamins A, B, D and E are tastier — thicker, creamier, more delicious.”

www.danone.co.zaFacebookTwitter

 

Vintage inspiration

Increasingly, brands are looking to the past for inspiration in dealing with the innovations of the present. Montblanc is the latest brand to pay tribute to the past, in the form of the legendary Minerva chronographs with its brand new 1858 Chronograph Tachymeter Blue Limited Edition 100 timepiece.

Founded under the name Minerva and acquired in 2007 by Montblanc, the new timepiece has been inspired by Villeret’s legendary Minerva chronographs — the reference in the field of chronographs and stopwatches during the 1920s and ’30s, these legendary timekeepers were able to measure fractions of a second with the utmost precision; a feat of manufacturing for the time.

The limited edition of 100 pieces celebrates both traditional Swiss artisanal watchmaking and the rich heritage of Montblanc’s Villeret Manufacture, but offers a contemporary twist to the past with a large 44mm stainless steel case. The addition of a deep blue dial with a tachymetric scale for measuring speeds over distance, along with a matching blue alligator strap, is also meant to contribute to reinforcing the vintage look of this timepiece.

www.montblanc.comwww.stories.montblanc.comFacebookTwitter

 

Cheryl Hunter

Shelf Life is MarkLives.com’s weekly column covering all things new. Notify us of yours at shelflife at marklives dot com. Want to sponsor Shelf Life? Contact us here.

Cheryl Hunter (@cherylhunter) has written for the South African media, marketing and advertising industries for more than 15 years. A former editor of M&M in Independent Newspapers and contributor to Bizcommunity, AdFocus, AdReview and the Ad Annual, she has also produced for various television networks and currently consults on communication strategy and media liaison.

— MarkLives’ round-up of top ad and media industry news and opinion in your mailbox every Monday and Thursday. Sign up here!

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