After a great success in Berlin, the World Routes roadshow moves to Abu Dhabi next year, the home of an award winning route development team. Abu Dhabi Airports Company (ADAC) picked up the Asian region award and overall winner honour during this year's expanded Routes Marketing Awards, which took place during the Berlin Networking Evening on the site of the new Berlin Brandenburg Airport Willy Brandt, nine months before the new airport for Germany’s capital region is due to open.
The awards, which are voted exclusively by the airlines, included four regional categories: Europe, the Americas, Asia and Africa as in previous years. This year also saw the introduction of two new awards also voted exclusively by airlines: the best network performance by an airline planning team and the best destination marketing campaign by a tourism authority.
Budapest Airport were named as the winner from the European region, with Los Angeles World Airports honoured from the Americas region. From the Africa region Accra International Airport, Ghana were ranked top whilst the Asia Region and the top honours went to Abu Dhabi Airports Company.
“We at Abu Dhabi Airports Company are deeply honored to have all our efforts recognized by the airline community. During the past year we have been focusing on showcasing Abu Dhabi as a growing dynamic destination and the opportunities for airlines to develop from our airport. We believe this success is a result of our understanding of our airlines needs and delivering the best support to help them grow their routes,” said George Karamanos, Vice President Corporate Marketing and Communications for Abu Dhabi Airport.
“Moreover, our basic philosophy revolves around having a direct dialogue with all our airline partners for which our pioneering Airline Marketing Blog has been a key contributor. We will continue working closely with both our new and existing partners to provide them with our award-wining support and look forward to welcoming everyone next year in Abu Dhabi," he added.
The prestige of the World Routes Awards is largely due to the fact that these widely sought after awards are solely nominated by the best people to judge the effectiveness of any airport marketing campaign, network performance and destination marketing campaign - The Airline Networking Planning Community.
“The World Routes Awards are very highly regarded by airports as they are the only awards in the industry that reward and acknowledge their marketing to airlines,” said Peter Von Moltke, Chief Executive Officer of UBM Aviation, parent company of sponsor OAG. “I am delighted that we have introduced the new categories this year so the Awards are truly representative of the route development community that has gathered in Berlin, and they are something we hope to further develop in future years.”
In addition to the shortlisted finalists nominated by the airlines the regional winners from each of the regional Routes events from 2011 automatically gained a place in the final judging. A respected panel of industry executives then reviewed the lists and submissions from the nominated airports in order to determine the winners.
The panel consisted of the following experts: Mr Markku Nokkala, Chief Network & Planning Officer for Oman Air; Mr Buddy Anslinger, formerly of Continental Airlines; Mr Bob Hill, Director Network Planning for American Airlines; Mr Germal Khan, Senior Vice President for Malaysia Airlines; Mr Lee Lipton, Director of Network Planning for Aer Lingus.
Now you too can see what ADAC has achieved this past year and why the panel selected them as the overall winner this year. Click here to view the airport's World Routes 2011 Awards submission on a special microsite of the company.
Click here for an exclusive The HUB video interview with Peter Hoslin, Head of Airline Marketing, Abu Dhabi Airports Company, immediately after being presented with the awards in Berlin.