How sexy can insurance really be? I only ask because I’ve been rather taken aback by the advertising campaign seeking to relaunch the former Liverpool Victoria Friendly Society as a trendy general insurer for bikers and lovers worldwide.

They say that in the aspirational world of advertising you can be whatever you want to be and LV, as the 164-year-old society prefers to be known as these days, is rather pushing the envelope.

When I met chief executive Mike Rogers two years ago, he was disparaging the heavy antique furniture in the organisation’s City office (he said it made the place look like a museum) and bemoaning a corporate name so long that it wouldn’t fit on the stumps in its English cricket sponsorship.

What could be done with this long moniker, he questioned wearily. Would people think the firm made luncheon vouchers if it shortened its name to LV or that it was a pub if it renamed itself “The Vic”.

Now the rebranding guys have been in and convinced the organisation that LV is a kind of text message shorthand for love and aren’t they meant to be a friendly society anyway?

The result is a new logo that sees the V become a heart and an ad with romantically-entwined young lovers roaring about on motorbikes that are presumably insured by what used to be Liverpool Victoria.

Now direct insurers’ ads have always been somewhat at the tabloid end of the scale, whether they feature red telephones or householders screeching because they’ve just been quoted happy for home or car insurance.

It’s difficult to see commercial insurers feeling the need to do anything similar to attract business to business customers.

But actually, isn’t what they do much more cosmopolitan, exciting and glamorous than the mere business of covering cars and homes for consumers?

First, there is the simple activity of getting on with life. In the world of hi-tech media and communications, how many satellites would get launched if insurers weren’t there to underwrite the chance that they might go out of orbit and never be seen again?

So you might say goodbye to your TV digibox and your summer holiday and favourite pastimes might have to go too.

Would airlines be able to operate without insurance? Would big football matches kick off or sound systems buzz into action at major rock concerts? Would you even be able to take a stroll in a park if the public liability insurers suddenly refused coverage?

You get the picture and I haven’t even mentioned disasters yet. Where would the victims of the California fires, Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans, the floods in Yorkshire, Tewkesbury and Oxford and yes 9/11 itself be without someone to pick up the tab?

If you’re reading this, I’m probably preaching to the converted but the point is this: squeezed as they are by cyclical pricing and needing to be able to attract the best new talent, why don’t insurers spend more time and money raising the profile of what they do?

Commercial Union had a decent go at this a while ago and people still remember its tagline of never making a drama out of a crisis.

More recently Zurich has followed up along a similar theme with its reminder that it exists “Because Change Happenz”.

However, the industry could go a great deal further. It’s not enough for it to bemoan that it is still regarded as grey, dull and uninteresting, despite employing hundreds of thousands of people and making a huge contribution to the national and global economies.

It needs to work hard with public perceptions to reverse and redress the negative image that people have of insurance and to start to realise that it is the unregarded cog that keeps the global machine functioning.

Insurance is about life and about death but it’s also about being able to take all kinds of risks at personal and commercial levels because if things go wrong there will be someone to pick up the tab.

It allows motorists to brave the M25. It permits Manchester United to let Wayne Rooney to play for England even though they know he might come back injured. And it ensures that container ships, arguably the engines of globalisation, can function despite the risk that their cargos might join the hordes of treasure under the sea.

Insurance also plays a part in preparing for the future, whether it’s dealing with climate change or putting a spacecraft on Mars. And it underpins human relationships, from buying an engagement ring to buying a home.

Is that sexy enough a script for some enterprising insurer to take to adland? If they can produce pink hearts from the stuffy old Liverpool Victoria, there must be a way of revitalising the image of commercial insurance.

This entry was posted by Andrew Cave on Thursday, November 8th, 2007 at 4:51 pm and is filed under Insurance Commentary.