EBAA Ambassador 2021

PRIMUS AERO: Coloring outside the lines

 

Young, diverse, and passionate about sustainability, community engagement, and customer service, Primus Aero takes pride in being ‘a little different’.

It’s not every day that a company starts their elevator pitch saying, “well, we’re a little different”. But then again, not every company is Primus Aero.

“Because we’re a small company, we often have to shout a little louder to be heard,” says Matthias Kortschak, Chief Operations Officer at Primus Aero. “We tend to do this by having fun, being funny, and colouring outside the lines.”

“We have a bit of a reputation for doing things that others might find ‘shocking’ – especially in marketing,” adds Marketing Manager Anna Gletthofer. “It’s almost become our role in the industry, and we’re ok with that.”

As a case in point, just check out the company’s social media feeds, which regularly feature such fun games as ‘guess the plane’ and humorous videos. Or how about their goodies? Like the company notebooks with covers that proclaim ‘DAMMIT! You Look Good Today!’

Young, Innovate, and Hungry to Grow

The company accredits its unique brand of thinking and energy to its youthfulness. Founded in 2010, Primus Aero, which provides a range of aircraft management, airworthiness review, spare parts acquisition, and transportation and consulting services, isn’t just a relatively new company, with an average employee age of 30, it’s also a very young company.

“This is one of our biggest advantages, as it gives us a unique spirit,” says Kortschak. “As a result, we are constantly trying to innovate and change things, it’s a fundamental part of who we are.”

According to Kortschak, nothing is too small or too mundane to be changed – not even paperwork. “A good portion of our customer interaction is done through inspection reports and other paperwork,” he says. “But this paperwork is boring and dull, which is not an accurate impression of who we are.”

Instead, the company has revamped and redesigned all its forms and reports. “We adapted digital User Experience principles and created a format that is clean, modern, accessible, and engaging,” adds Gletthofer.

In addition to being a young company, Primus Aero is also a diverse company. Not only is nearly half of its staff female, many of its departments – including finance and spare parts – are run by women. “Diversity is incredibly important to our company culture,” notes Kortschak. “It is also key to our being able to recruit the smart, energetic talent we depend on.”

And recruiting they are. While other companies shed staff during the COVID-19 pandemic, Primus Aero has been growing – from 13 full-time staff at the end of 2019 to 24 as of September 2021.

Committed to the Community and the Environment

With its sights set on continued growth, the company is increasing its commitments to community engagement and sustainability, two issues that rank high in importance for both current and future employees.

As to community engagement, last year the team participated in the Wings for Life World Run, which raises funds for spinal cord research.

Like Primus Aero itself, this run embraces being different. Instead of running a particular distance from start to finish, a car drives behind the pack. When the car overtakes a runner, they are eliminated. In essence, the last runner running wins.

Primus also embraces the concept of ‘think global, act local’. “Here in Austria, we are surrounded by some great local businesses doing amazing work and producing excellent products,” says Gletthofer. “As part of the community, we always make an effort to support these small businesses.”

For example, whenever the company sends gifts to its customers, they try to source everything locally and even include little maps of where the items come from. They also use recyclable packaging materials, reuse as much packaging as possible, and avoid plastics.

Speaking of sustainability, Primus Aero operates a fleet of electric cars for its employees and has made chargers available on its premises. “We’re not producing stuff and we’re not flying aircraft, so it’s hard to talk too much about ‘big picture’ sustainability,” says Kortschak. “But we do what we can on an everyday basis.”

One thing they do is spare parts, which play a critical role in the circular economy. By being repaired and reused, the average lifecycle of an aircraft part can be up to 40 years – a remarkable feat in today’s consume and pitch society.

Although individually these contributions may seem small, Gletthofer stresses that their impact quickly adds up. “You can do a lot outside the sustainable aviation fuel arena to make business aviation more sustainable, all of which add up to a rather big contribution,” she says.

“We’re simply trying to make what we can better in our own little way – whether that be the customer experience, the environment, or just an employee’s day,” adds Kortschak. “It’s the little things that add up to big change – and that’s what we’re all about here at Primus Aero.”

 

 

This article was originally published by the EBAA, see the original here.