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Flying Trumpets is founded on four principles about marketing, content, events and digital.

  1. Marketing is what powers a business. If you think of it with a reductive qualifier, or a negative conjoin – think “just marketing” or “marketing cost – it is being done wrong. Marketing is all about investing deliberately and carefully, in creating, communicating and delivering value for and to your target market; so that the return you receive, is a multiple of your investment, because you have successfully satisfied their needs.

Marketing is the art and science of creating and delivering value to satisfy the needs of a target market at a profit.

Philip Kotler

2. Content has always been king. The role of Chief Content Officer may be new but great content, has always been at the heart of successful marketing, events and digital. Whether you are joining the conversation, adding value to it or owning it, you need to match your content to your channel, audience and intended outcome.

3. Events provide a platform to inspire, educate, position your brand and motivate your audience to act. Whether you are a commercial events organiser looking to build your business; an association wanting to bring your membership together (and make some additional revenue in the process); an organisation hoping to impress your clients or employees; or an individual intent on building your personal brand; producing or just speaking at an event can be expensive, stressful and shambolic or high impact and profitable. It is all about knowledge, attention to 1000 details and execution.

4. Digital is ubiquitous and multi-faceted. Digital transformation, digital marketing, e-commerce, dot.com businesses and digital systems and infrastructure are all very different things. We’re really experienced, and with all due modesty, really good at the first four. We can introduce you to brilliant people and businesses who are good at the rest.

HISTORY

Beatrice Warde, 20th century writer and scholar of typography who wrote the broadsheet: This is a Printing Office

Hanging on the wall of Susanna’s study is the broadsheet by Beatrice Warde: This is a Printing Office. An original hung in the reception of her Grandpa’s printing company: The Lane Press in Burlington, VT, USA. Another copy hung in the reception of Emap Ltd when David Gilbertson, ex journalist, editor of the oldest still running newspaper in the world and media mogul, was its CEO.

One spring day as Susanna was wondering what we should name our new company, she found herself looking at it, two words jumped out FLY and TRUMPET. And so Flying Trumpets was born.

This is a Printing Office by Beatrice Warde:
Crossroads of civilization. Refuge of all the arts. Against the ravages of time. Armory of fearless truth. Against whispering rumor. Incessant TRUMPET of trade. From this place words may FLY abroad. Not to perish on waves of sound. Not to vary with the writer’s hand. But fixed in time having been verified by proof. Friend you stand on sacred ground. This is a printing office.

A picture of Susanna's mother and her grandpa reading 'This is a Printing Office' which hangs in the reception of the Lane Press in Burlington Vermont USA

What makes it resonate so much with us? First of all is our admiration for Beatrice Warde. She has become synonymous with an industry from which, as a woman, she was barred. She was a researcher, a creator, a believer in advertising and a fierce proponent of legibility first in typography. Then there is what it says. In a time when people seriously propose such things as alternative facts, we like the idea of an armoury of fearless truth and that things can be “verified by proof”.  As marketers and business leaders we think that trade is a good thing, and incessant trumpeting of it, better still.

THE SENIOR TEAM

TeamSK
Susanna Kempe

Susanna Kempe, Founder, is a senior board director and strategic adviser to media, marketing, professional services and SaaS businesses with international multi-sector experience of digital transformation in B2B intelligence, education, fashion and media. Prior to founding Flying Trumpets, she was CEO of the leading trend forecaster WGSN. Other executive leadership roles include Chief Marketing and Strategy Officer of Emap (now Ascential), CMO and Investor Relations Director of Informa Plc and Group Content and Marketing Partner, Brunswick Group.

TeamLouise
Louise Obadia

Louise Obadia, Senior Consultant, founded Adam Smith Conferences which she sold to IIR in 2004 and divested to Trinity Events Group in 2015. Her previous experience includes MD of Digital Media and New Business Development at Informa where she was responsible for identifying marketing service opportunities and integrating acquisitions in Finance, TMT and Life Sciences. She has carried out extensive market research for the trade show market and has detailed knowledge of the competitive landscape. She is an expert in conferences in Russia and emerging markets.

TeamJenny
Jennifer Halbert

Jennifer Halbert, Account Director, is a marketing consultant with experience in both agency and client roles. She has a strong track record supporting clients’ brand strategy and campaign planning in FMCG, financial services, the legal market and healthcare as well as recent experience in luxury travel and the leisure market. Her experience includes international product launches and roll-outs. Jenny has worked in Asia Pacific on brand relaunches and new packaging developments as well as co-ordinating FMCG brand regional communications and advertising.