The invisible engine

The client

Vitol is one of the world's largest energy and commodities trading organisations — with operations spanning oil, gas, power, and infrastructure across almost every major market on earth. Most people have never heard of them. That's not an accident. Vitol operates at the infrastructure level of global trade: essential, vast, and largely invisible to anyone outside the industry.

Phase 1 — 2024: Finding the narrative

Decades of growth, complexity, and M&A had left Vitol in an unusual position: an organisation of enormous scale and capability that had gradually lost its ability to articulate what it actually was. The business had grown faster than the language it used to describe itself. Internally, people had different answers. Externally, the messaging was vague, generic, and indistinguishable from competitors.

Rather than starting with a brief or a framework, I went back to first principles. I analysed speeches and remarks by Vitol's senior executives — the moments where people speak without a script tend to reveal more about what an organisation actually believes than any brand document. What came back was consistent: Vitol doesn't position itself at the front of anything. It operates behind everything. It is the infrastructure that keeps global energy and commodities flowing — not a supplier, not a brand, but the essential mechanism underneath.

The insight

Vitol's invisibility isn't a communications problem. It's the truest thing about them. They are the engine that powers global trade — unseen by most, indispensable to all. The narrative wasn't about making Vitol more visible. It was about owning the power of being the thing everything else depends on.

Phase 2 — 2025: Building the messaging

Vitol came back in 2025 with the next challenge: turning the brand narrative into a working messaging system — straplines, audience-specific messages, and the language framework to guide communications across trade shows, events, and industry materials.

The energy and commodities sector suffers from what I called a "sea of same" — an almost universal collapse into identical, interchangeable claims. Sustainability overload. Vague promises. Empty corporate language. Glencore, Trafigura, Gunvor, Shell — the category is saturated with phrases that could belong to anyone and therefore belong to no one.

The messaging work developed three conceptual territories — The Business of Energy, Expertise in Motion, and The Invisible Engine — each with strapline options and audience flex across Vitol's four key stakeholder groups: industry partners, energy companies, wholesale and utilities, and government stakeholders. Alongside this, a practical messaging guide including rules, forbidden terminology, and a structural framework for longer-form communications.

The relationship

Vitol returned for a second engagement after the first. That's the clearest signal of whether the work landed. Two phases, two years, one ongoing relationship — built on direct access and a clear strategic point of view rather than agency process.