HOUSTON – Look out for a new Continental Airlines (NYSE: CAL) Boeing 737-900ER, which is painted with a retro livery to commemorate the airline’s 75th anniversary, which will be celebrated July 15, 2009. The livery was was originally used on aircraft beginning in 1947 and is called The Blue Skyway,MORE HERE
A plane is a plane, and if it flies, it looks like an airplane because it is an airplane. Unfortunately, that is not always true with commercial and private planes. Some airplanes, for instance have a nose too long, or a body too thin and narrow, giving the plane aMORE HERE
An Ad Age piece by Al Ries on value pricing reminds us how crummy and proletarian the airline business has become, and how un-important branding is to particularly our American airlines. The story is called Variable Pricing is the Ultimate Brand-Destroyer. Reis’ point is that because of value pricing, consumersMORE HERE
AMSTERDAM – When governments come and go, companies that are dependable throughout the decades, even colonial companies, earn enormous goodwill. Such is the place of KLM Royal Dutch Airlines, which is one of the major European carriers to Africa. While American carriers like Delta haved turned themselves into boring genericMORE HERE
STOCKHOLM – We are so there. It’s a Jumbo Jet hotel that opened in January in Stockholm. It’s a converted 747, made extra cool because it was formerly operated by Pan Am. The plane is apparently called Liv; it was grounded at Stockholm Arlanda Airport back in November 2002 andMORE HERE
We wrote some time ago about the different versions of the Pan Am name that have survived even though the airline has died and come back to life a number of times. Such is the goodwill in the brand that it keeps on selling product. Today, we write about PanMORE HERE
Shame on Northwest’s management for allowing its identity to be destroyed by Delta. Not only is a great bit of American history going to be lost, unnecessarily, but a large amount of shareholder value, in the Northwest identity, is going to be lost. This is not an issue of empty-but-funMORE HERE
If KLM and Air France can keep their unique identities after a merger, then why can’t Delta and Northwest keep their identities? This week, Landor Associates, the branding firm, redid the positioning of KLM, Royal Dutch Airlines. This was to help build on KLM’s long heritage. KLM is part ofMORE HERE
JAMAICA, NY – The recent renovation of the Eero Saarinen-designed TWA Flight Center, now known as T5, was a true passing of the torch, as Ruth Richter Holden, daughter of TWA co-founder Paul Richter, flew her restored Lockheed Electra into JFK Airport for the dedication ceremony. Ruth Richter Holden, quiteMORE HERE
NEW YORK – JetBlue Airways (Nasdaq:JBLU) today opened Terminal 5, the airline’s home at John F. Kennedy International Airport. All JetBlue departures from JFK will operate from T5, as will all domestic arrivals and international arrivals that pre-clear U.S. customs prior to arriving in New York. The first flight scheduledMORE HERE