In this exclusive Commercial Integrator interview, members of the FORTÉ leadership team, formerly AVI Systems, discuss the company’s rebranding. Of course, Commercial Integrator shared that story when it broke back in April.
Interviewees Jeff Stoebner (CEO), Roger Patrick (COO) and Craig Gudorf (vice president of brand marketing) offer a persuasive case for why FORTÉ represents the organization‘s evolved identity. Moreover, they share its go-forward operational vision.
The Inside Scoop on FORTÉ Rebranding
This exclusive interview is your chance to get “the inside scoop” on what precipitated this rebranding of AVI Systems to FORTÉ in April. Plus, we discuss how the company’s ambitions will reshape the integration landscape moving forward.
According to Stoebner, “The FORTÉ rollout — the branding rollout — is really the name catching up with all the work that we’ve been doing in the background probably for about eight years to position the company with its clients for the next 50 years.” That positioning includes FORTÉ’s established differentiators: global reach, established best practices, IT-minded AV integration and more.
Patrick alludes to FORTÉ’s positioning statement, as well as its internal rollout to its own team members, saying that leadership is “…asking them to use an evolved language. We bring people, spaces and technology together to transform the modern workplace.”
For his part, Gudorf lists some of what FORTÉ brings to the table: a top 1% Microsoft solutions provider, robust managed service capabilities, deep technical expertise and strong logistics capabilities. “So, you think about all those things together,” Gudorf says, “and [you start to wonder], ‘Why do we have AV in our title?’ Why are we limiting ourselves to something that is a critical part of what we do, but we do so much more than that?” That broader, more expansive name is FORTÉ.
Later in the conversation, FORTÉ leadership touches on the following:
- how FORTÉ really hopes to position itself in the market
- some of the work that FORTÉ does with A-class organizations around the world
- internal feedback about the rebranding, direct from FORTÉ associates
- and much more
To watch the full conversation with the FORTÉ leadership team, discussing the recent rebranding and name change, check out the embedded video below.
