Dive Brief:
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Photo equipment and marketing company Ridgefield Park, NJ-based C&A Marketing Friday won airline catalog SkyMall’s trademark and e-commerce business at bankruptcy auction.
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C & A co-owner and executive Chaim Pikarski says he’ll be revamping the failed enterprise with a focus on e-commerce but that the infamous airline back-pocket catalog may also return.
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Scott Jordan, CEO of tech gear company ScottEVest, a SkyMall advertiser, in January had said that he was interested in taking over the catalog and revamping it for the “digital age.”
Dive Insight:
Remaking SkyMall for the digital age is a long time coming, but it’s in this very moment that the approach has vast potential because WiFi connections are just now becoming more routine in flight. Pikarski seems intent on making SkyMall into an e-commerce company, though he didn’t rule out a return of infamous catalog. The move clearly goes beyond a switch from catalog to online, though, and far beyond returning the catalog to the seat pocket; Pikarski says that for too long SkyMall featured products that simply didn’t sell.
“In one format or another we may introduce some kind of catalog back to the airlines, if it makes sense,” he said. “The ecosystem of travel is larger than the airplane seat in front of you.”
