Many companies arrived in Hamburg with new headline products to promote. For ABC International, the headline act is the company itself. “We have now completed our transition from a pure cabin branding supplier to an overall cabin service and product supplier,” says chief commercial officer, Rodolfo Baldascino.
As with many companies, ABC International used the threat caused by the pandemic as an opportunity. “Before Covid, we were recognised as a cabin branding specialist. But branding is not essential to the air operations. So in a downturn, branding activity tends to be one of the first things cut by an airline,” he says.
”When we saw this happening, we realised that there was also an opportunity for us to rethink our portfolio products and services to one that is more robust and not so susceptible to a downturn.
“The idea was to enlarge our portfolio, increasing the engineering services where we were already suppliers, and to concentrate our strategic marketing and sales efforts towards airlines and lessors by supplying them cabin modification services,” he says. “In particular, when lessors ask for cabin refurbishments to support an aircraft transitioning from one operator to the next, they not only want to have an engineering solution, they want a full package.”
Baldascino says that the shift in the approach means that its cabin refurbishment services and design organisation approval (DOA) services are the larger part of our turnover and our portfolio. ”Three years after the end of the pandemic, we are now recognised – especially by the lessor community – as a reputable company able to deliver good packages to support cabin revamping, cabin refurbishment and aircraft transition,” he says.
Other important moves include the company having its own warehouse of raw materials, as well as establishing partnerships with suppliers of such materials.
“A good example of a partnership is the one we have with an Italian tannery, that actually works on linefits with Airbus,” he explains. ”They have both organic and eco leather that we can get in whatever colour the customer requests, in a very short lead time. We can therefore prepare packages for customers that want to change seat covers.
“It’s easy to say, but it means we provide the complete certification dossier, the engineering, the reverse engineering, the design, cut and sew, supply of the raw materials, manufacturing of the covers, and delivery with all the correct forms,” he says.
“The completion of the transition will see us become production organisation approved (POA) by EASA in the next 12 to 15 months, hopefully even less,” Baldascino says.
