Airbus: Crafting stories for annual and sustainability reports over 16 years

Need:

Just a few years after its creation through a merger in 2000, EADS (which became Airbus Group in 2014) needed a writer with ideas for a fresh approach to its annual report. It wanted a writer to develop messaging telling the story of how the integration of three European aerospace and defence companies was creating value for shareholders. Ten years later, it also wanted help from a writer who could partner with the head of ESG & sustainability affairs to write a series of sustainability reports.

Approach:

Writing key company reports that define investor relations and sustainability messaging takes diligence and trust. The starting point for the reports was typically a research trip across the key offices and manufacturing facilities in France and Germany.

Over time, though, information gathering depended less on physical travel and more on reading key documents published during the year. The drafting process involved an outline and a series of drafts that were approved by different layers of management.

Outcome:

The annual reports written after 2004 were acknowledged as a major improvement, going on to win several awards. Over the following 16 years of Clerkenwell’s involvement, they became a mainstay of EADS/Airbus’s investor relations communications.

The sustainability reports were only published for three years but they established a messaging platform that is still used across an aerospace and defence company that makes approximately half of the world’s commercial aircraft and is among Europe’s major arms manufacturers.