A&K rebrand will ‘elevate’ business, says marketing chief

Abercrombie & Kent’s chief marketing officer has said the operator’s new tagline, logo and website will “bring the brand to life”.

Speaking to Aspire, Peter Chipchase said: “When I looked at the business, I could see it was working and doing very well, but also that it was kind of decentralised. The brand was interpreted in very different ways, and I feel like some of its cache had fallen off the radar.

“We saw an opportunity to rebrand to become the gold standard and bring the brand to life.”

Chipchase said the first priority had been to become “a fully integrated business”. This involved rebuilding the website and creating a new booking system in order to “build an end-to-end luxury customer experience”.

Centralising the business also involved rebranding its collection of safari lodges and riverboats from Sanctuary Retreats to A&K Sanctuary.

Chipchase described this move as an “absolute key priority” and said one of the operator’s goals was to emphasise the unique properties of each ‘sanctuary’.

He said: “You don’t have A&K without Sanctuary – it’s a big part of our story. Our intent now is to make each one of the sanctuaries famous in its own right, so they’ve each got their individual identity beneath the A&K brand.”

Chipchase said the operator’s main goal was to be the go-to source for travel inspiration.

“The website is a big channel for us in terms of acquisition of clients, but it’s also a destination in itself. We want people who are interested in travel to check Abercrombie & Kent’s website and socials to get inspired. We want people to think: ‘If they’re doing it, then it’s got to be good’,” he said.

The rebrand also saw the introduction of A&K’s Souvenir magazine. Chipchase said he wants the publication, which will be people and experience-focused, to become “like a Bible” for people to uncover new destinations.

The brand also completed a range of destination photoshoots to better showcase its product. “Before, we didn’t have any owned assets,” Chipchase said. “We were using the same stock photography that other travel businesses were using, so we’ve gone around the word and taken our own photography.”

Chipchase also praised the brand’s non-profit organisation, Abercrombie & Kent Philanthropy (AKP), which is “more dedicated than ever” to benefitting the destinations A&K visits.

“Geoffrey [A&K’s founder] is a genuine innovator,” Chipchase said. “We try to do things that pay homage to that, and AKP is one of those things. We’ve now integrated that into everything we do.”