Great British Railways: Branding options?

[Meerkat]

"National Rail" would've been a much better brand name, but under Johnson's government everything was fantastic and world beating, so needed to be branded as such, hence the "Great British Railways" name.

No doubt if the NHS was proposed today, it would be called something ridiculous like the "Great British Health Service".

National Rail is a terrible brand - pretty meaningless and incredibly bland.
And causes confusion between national rail and National Rail

 

[Bletchleyite]

And causes confusion between national rail and National Rail

What national rail isn't National Rail? Unless you mean the nations of Scotland and Wales, but I am sure they will cope.

The phrase was actually coined by TfL for signage in Tube stations before ATOC (Association of Train Operating Companies, later Rail Development Group) adopted it.

 

[Meerkat]

What national rail isn't National Rail? Unless you mean the nations of Scotland and Wales, but I am sure they will cope.

The phrase was actually coined by TfL for signage in Tube stations before ATOC (Association of Train Operating Companies, later Rail Development Group) adopted it.

TFL used national rail as it covered all the TOCs and OAs, so it is an example of confusion - would such references mean National Rail or national rail?
Just call it British Rail or English Rail, and ignore the self flagellators who get their knickers in a twist about such things.

 

[Mike Machin]

Holding organisation - Rail England. Customer-facing operating divisions - Northern, Midland, South East, South West and Inter-City. Simples!

 

[renegademaster]

Someone getting a "Rail England" service from Aberdeen to Edinburgh sounds like it would annoy SNP types more than getting a British Rail or National Rail service between two Scottish destinations

 

[michael8]

I don't like Great British Railways. Sounds like Great British Air - the joke airline on "Come Fly With Me" (Walliams and Lucas). Also, I don't think it's correct - Great Britain is a geographical area, fine, but "Great British" is not a nationality nor a (compound) adjective !

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 16 Jan 2025 ==

I think National Rail would be fine. British Rail fine too, but I can understand why they want to move away from that.

National Rail.
National Express.
British Airways.
easyJet.
National Health Service.
National Lottery.

Transport for London.
Transport for Greater Manchester.

South Western Railway.
Southern Railway.

"Great British Railways" just doesn't fit into any of that for me !

 

[David M]

Someone getting a "Rail England" service from Aberdeen to Edinburgh sounds like it would annoy SNP types more than getting a British Rail or National Rail service between two Scottish destinations

I think you're wrong.
What annoys most is Scottish products being labelled as UK - see British haggis or British shortbread!
Union Jacks plastered over pretty much anything made in Scotland at the supermarkets that used to show the Saltire.
If something's English, don't be afraid to call it so.

 

[renegademaster]

I think you're wrong.
What annoys most is Scottish products being labelled as UK - see British haggis or British shortbread!
Union Jacks plastered over pretty much anything made in Scotland at the supermarkets that used to show the Saltire.
If something's English, don't be afraid to call it so.

It's not just an English thing though.
Many services run in Scotland and Wales , and hopefully GBR will retain running the ticketing system for Scotrail and TfW.

 

[greataj]

I don't particularly see a point in rebranding everything. Most rail operators are representative of the area/region they primarily serve anyway (LNER, Cross Country, West Midlands Trains, Greater Anglia etc etc.) and I think that regional brand identity is important.

To maintain that under a single brand you'd almost need GBR Northwest Regional, GBR Northwest Intercity, GBR East Midlands Regional... it quickly gets quite messy and that would all overlap anyway.

When I think of say Liverpool Street, Greater Anglia almost instantly springs to mind. When I think of West Coast I instantly think Euston, and so on. I think that brand differentiation has become ingrained in a lot of people's travel.

Not to mention it's a monumentous task to complete that wouldn't come cheap. Changing the external liveries is one thing, but you'd need to standardise the interior look and feel, audio/ announcements and visual screen guidance to name a few to really do it justice. You then have a whole host of rolling stock with very different characteristics largely associated to the train operator as it is currently, so you're never going to get a truly consistent product across all regional, or all Intercity services.

For me, GBR is nothing more than a kind of internal, government branding for the nationalisation of the franchise operators, rather than something that should be directly a customer facing brand to define all British rail.

 

[LLivery]

I don't particularly see a point in rebranding everything. Most rail operators are representative of the area/region they primarily serve anyway (LNER, Cross Country, West Midlands Trains, Greater Anglia etc etc.) and I think that regional brand identity is important.

To maintain that under a single brand you'd almost need GBR Northwest Regional, GBR Northwest Intercity, GBR East Midlands Regional... it quickly gets quite messy and that would all overlap anyway.

When I think of say Liverpool Street, Greater Anglia almost instantly springs to mind. When I think of West Coast I instantly think Euston, and so on. I think that brand differentiation has become ingrained in a lot of people's travel.

Not to mention it's a monumentous task to complete that wouldn't come cheap. Changing the external liveries is one thing, but you'd need to standardise the interior look and feel, audio/ announcements and visual screen guidance to name a few to really do it justice. You then have a whole host of rolling stock with very different characteristics largely associated to the train operator as it is currently, so you're never going to get a truly consistent product across all regional, or all Intercity services.

For me, GBR is nothing more than a kind of internal, government branding for the nationalisation of the franchise operators, rather than something that should be directly a customer facing brand to define all British rail.

Well the whole point is to reduce fragmentation and simplify branding. There's no need to maintain full on separate brands for services in the East of England or for those in the Southern Region for example. GBR Southern, Anglia, Great Western, Midland, Northern, Intercity would be the furthest I'd go with separate brands, with a few devolved/suburban brands like German S Bahns and I'd maintain Thameslink. Endless brands costs money for little benefit and cause more confusion.

 

[irish_rail]

Endless brands costs money for little benefit and cause more confusion.

Yep, but apparently that is the plan! Continuation of lots of different operators as well as new devolved ones. The mess is about to get a whole lot messier!

 

[Meerkat]

Well the whole point is to reduce fragmentation and simplify branding.

Nope, the whole point is ideological nationalisation. Any fragmentation benefits are in back office not branding.

Endless brands costs money for little benefit and cause more confusion.

Branding has benefits, otherwise why do companies bother?

 

[ollyexe2808]

Nope, the whole point is ideological nationalisation. Any fragmentation benefits are in back office not branding.

Branding has benefits, otherwise why do companies bother?

I have been reading this thread for a while and it feels like there are definitely pros and cons to a unified brand and some good points made by all....

IMO - branding does matter, and it is quite important from a ticket sales and responsibility perspective. Thinking of my experiences in other countries, the first thing I would do is to see if there is a single national brand to buy a ticket from - and if I get into issues, that the responsibility is on a national brand to sort out or that I can find information from a single source without having to download other apps or consult information elsewhere. Often there is confusion over who is responsible for issues if and when they arise. For those who aren't familiar with the railways, it can be a minefield at present. I know people who think The Trainline is the National Rail app, that have never heard of the GWR app (I live in Devon) and often are shocked at ticket prices because they go with whatever they can find. A clear brand and point of reference is often needed to help make it clear who is in charge.

I would argue that the case for nationalisation is beyond ideological - after all, the pandemic broke the franchise system and it was pretty clear reform needed to happen. It was a Tory government that kickstarted the public *control* of the railways, even if Labour have gone further with ownership. In many regards, rail reform is a rare area of political consensus, even if the remedy varies. Norway has had some controversy over its liberalisation of rail - but I must admit, the EnTur app which looks to unify rail companies, alongside buses, taxis and even scooters, is a really useful point of information and avoids the fragmentation.

So in short - Meerkat is right to say that benefits will probably be in the back office but I believe signage and 'front end' development will be quite important too. The risk is that one unfit-for-purpose system is replaced by another one....

 

[Mikey C]

The current situation DOES cause problems, due to the fragmentation it creates in public areas.

For example a couple of months ago, I spent ages shuttling around Leeds station trying to find a right member of staff, after a major problem with the line between Manchester and Leeds meant I missed the last LNER train back to London. The ticket office (Network Rail) advised me to talk to the operators, the Northern staff were helpful, but couldn't help me, the LNER person palmed me off straight away to TPE. The TPE person had vanished but eventually was found after a lot of running around between platforms.

It would have been so much easier if the platform staff all worked for one organisation, and there was one place to go to for assistance, rather than each operator being responsible for just their services. And being able to pass on responsibility.

 

[Simon75]

The InterCity London markets aren't substantially different from one another.



InterCity was popular and profitable.

Intercity is often still referred for long distance journeys

 

[Meerkat]

The current situation DOES cause problems, due to the fragmentation it creates in public areas.

For example a couple of months ago, I spent ages shuttling around Leeds station trying to find a right member of staff, after a major problem with the line between Manchester and Leeds meant I missed the last LNER train back to London. The ticket office (Network Rail) advised me to talk to the operators, the Northern staff were helpful, but couldn't help me, the LNER person palmed me off straight away to TPE. The TPE person had vanished but eventually was found after a lot of running around between platforms.

It would have been so much easier if the platform staff all worked for one organisation, and there was one place to go to for assistance, rather than each operator being responsible for just their services. And being able to pass on responsibility.

Though if it was merged they would use that as an excuse to reduce staff, and getting punted around departments still happens within a single organisation!

 

[Bletchleyite]

Though if it was merged they would use that as an excuse to reduce staff, and getting punted around departments still happens within a single organisation!

There should (and will) absolutely be a consolidation of backoffice functions like customer service and ticketing resulting in an overall reduction of staff in those functions - that's one of the main savings available to GBR.

 

[Meerkat]

There should (and will) absolutely be a consolidation of backoffice functions like customer service and ticketing resulting in an overall reduction of staff in those functions - that's one of the main savings available to GBR.

Rather ironic if the union demands for nationalisation results in savings mainly through job losses rather than evil capitalist profits.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Rather ironic if the union demands for nationalisation results in savings mainly through job losses rather than evil capitalist profits.

Many of these losses are likely to be outside of their remit, e.g. if GBR created a single ticketing site and it was any good Trainline might go out of business or scale back substantially.

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== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 20 Jan 2025 ==

I've done a new thread to continue this cost saving discussion: https://www.railforums.co.uk/threads/great-british-railways-scope-for-money-savings.280436/

 

[renegademaster]

Many of these losses are likely to be outside of their remit, e.g. if GBR created a single ticketing site and it was any good Trainline might go out of business or scale back substantially.

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== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 20 Jan 2025 ==

I've done a new thread to continue this cost saving discussion: https://www.railforums.co.uk/threads/great-british-railways-scope-for-money-savings.280436/

NRE already exists and it's a bit crap
Hopefully the GBR team will improve it but I'm not getting hopes up. If they drag in whoever designs all the gov.uk Government Gateway stuff they might do well

 

[Mikey C]

Though if it was merged they would use that as an excuse to reduce staff, and getting punted around departments still happens within a single organisation!

What it would remove is passing on off responsibility, which is what happens now. As a rail customer stuck in Leeds due to a previous rail problem, with one unified organisation there would be one responsible party.

Instead, to continue my story, a "National Rail" infrastructure problem meant that TPE couldn't run trains to Leeds, meaning I missed by LNER train to London (I took a taxi to try and make the connection). This was eventually resolved by TPE writing a note authorising me to take a Cross Country train to Derby, where the slightly surprised EMR staff then checked with TPE, and a taxi eventually was arranged to take a few of us back to London. Indeed the Derby station manager was really helpful and organised, when the whole situation was nothing to do with EMR!

Apart from one organisation removing many of these boundaries, technology can definitely help as well. If someone at Leeds authorises me to travel to Derby to take onward taxis, that should be logged on a computer system, so staff anywhere in the country can see this and don't have to make phone calls to try and find out what's going on.

 

[styles]

• ScotRail
• EngRail
• RailCymru

 

[Pete_uk]

RailUK
Transport For England
Network Britain
RailNet
YouGo!

...

 

[michael8]

RailUK
Transport For England
Network Britain
RailNet
YouGo!

...

RailUK is nice. Modern, refreshing, does what it says on the tin.
Transport for England - doesn't quite match up IMO!
Network Britain - nice, but sounds like a broadband company
RailNet - sounds like RailUKforums' number 1 competitor
YouGo! - Good - sounds like the French OuiGo!

Great ideas Pete_uk

 

[Meerkat]

They will pay brand consultants millions to come up with “Wooosh!”, “Traingo!”, or summat

 

[michael8]

Can anyone explain why we can't just stick with National Rail as an entity that allows the individual companies to work together ? Will it be replaced by GBR ? If so, what's the point of the change ?

 

[styles]

View attachment 173211
Can anyone explain why we can't just stick with National Rail as an entity that allows the individual companies to work together ? Will it be replaced by GBR ? If so, what's the point of the change ?

Because it would be far too sensible? Also though, since the biggest commitments were dropped from GBR, like a true harmonisation of ticketing, I guess having a distinctive brand may make some sense.

 

[WibbleWobble]

Can anyone explain why we can't just stick with National Rail as an entity that allows the individual companies to work together ? Will it be replaced by GBR ? If so, what's the point of the change ?

I would imagine it is because National Rail is a brand owned by the Rail Delivery Group, and not the government - even though it uses the double arrow logo! I would imagine the brand would not be favoured by the government because it is inherently linked to the privatised era.

Plus, the Tories were obsessed with calling everything "Great British [whatever]", and Labour have just kept the name as GBR was already being set up.

 

[HSTEd]

I would imagine it is because National Rail is a brand owned by the Rail Delivery Group, and not the government - even though it uses the double arrow logo! I would imagine the brand would not be favoured by the government because it is inherently linked to the privatised era.

The rail delivery group is functionally owned by the state, or very soon will be.

 

[Sad Sprinter]

I think the intricate level of semantics we go through to describe the identity of our country is insane and we should just celebrate it for what it is.