It's a bird! It's a plane! No, it's an advertisement.

By Jasper Hamill
Sunday Herald
May. 07, 2008

NEXT TIME a flotilla of brand logos drifts over the horizon, don't fret - it's an advert, not a nervous breakdown.

A company called Flogos has launched the first custom-made clouds and will soon be bringing its product to Britain.

Produced by a dedicated machine at the rate of two a minute, the flogos can be made to any shape required and float for up to half an hour, soaring up to 30,000ft for a distance of 40 miles.

Made from air, a tiny amount of organic surfactant taken from a tree, and helium, flogos are also environmentally friendly, say the firm.

Huge brands such as Apple, Disney and Mercedes have already floated their logos in the sky and inventor Francisco Guerra hopes many more will follow suit.

He said: "I'm in the office from 7am because inquiries are coming from every square inch of the planet. We are making them as fast as we can but it's not enough.

"Every major advertising company in the world has come to discuss their roster. Some Fortune 500 companies have been too and in Korea, artists have told us they want to use flogos to make a kind of sculpture. The response has been incredible."

Guerra started his career in Hollywood, designing special effects.

After this, he struck gold with a machine that generates snow and a beer mat that detects date-rape drugs in drinks.

Guerra added: "This is a passive way to advertise. The only negative thing people can feel about them is jealousy, because they didn't come up with the idea first. Our problem is that we can't be in all of these places at the same time, so we're looking for distributors."

One prospective British distributor, John Hughes, who runs festivals around Britain and owns a creative communications group named Get Involved, called the flogos' inventor "a genius".

He said: "This is going to be a very successful product and will be picked up by early adopters creating strategies that make a big impact in the marketplace. That's where flogos should be and will be placed."

The flogos have been used for non-commercial purposes - such as publicising clean air projects in China - but cloud aficionados fear brand messages will prevail and sending hordes of adverts into the air could ruin the skyscape.

Gavin Pretor-Pinney, leader of the Cloud Appreciation Society, has written books on the gentle pursuit of cloud watching.

He said: "I find the concept of someone sending up clouds in the shape of a Coca-Cola logo, or something like that, absolutely abhorrent. If you live in the city you are constantly bombarded by corporate messages. Clouds, with their formlessness, are the last wilderness you have to gaze upon. It would be a sad day if you gaze up and find that you had a company logo in the clouds."

Reacting to the news flogos are soon to launch multicoloured variations, he thundered: "The colour of clouds when a low sun strikes them is one of the most beautiful colour schemes there is. You don't need to start introducing multicoloured, tutti-frutti clouds. I say leave our clouds alone. This matters to me, I tell you."

Aviators - even those flying the most vulnerable of aircraft - would not have to worry about flogos, claimed Colin Mackinnon, head of Microlight Scotland.

"I don't see them causing any real problems. Occasionally up there in the air you run into balloons. The first time I encountered one, I didn't even see it I just heard a bang and thought something had exploded in the aeroplane.

"These flogos are soft and fluffy and at least they won't make a bang when you fly through them. What concerns me more when I'm flying around in the sky is the increasing trend for unmanned aerial vehicles - stuff made out of metal and plastic rather than steam."

However any prospective "skyvertiser" in the UK must seek permission, the Civil Aviation Authority warned.