Aerolíneas Argentinas
Future-proofing a leading airline
In 2018, the Argentine travel industry experienced a major inflection point. The low-cost airlines entered the domestic flights business, posing a major threat to the bigger players in the region such as Aerolíneas Argentinas – Argentina’s largest airline and the nation’s flag carrier. It needed to make a bold move to restate its claim as the country’s leading airline.
Interbrand Buenos Aires partnered with Aerolíneas Argentinas to define a new positioning, visual and verbal system for the brand. At first, they decided that Austral (its domestic flight brand) should compete with the new low-cost players.
So the challenge was to then define the role and degree of linkage of the Austral brand with Aerolíneas Argentinas. However, our recommendation was that Aerolíneas Argentinas had to be a monolithic brand.
One of the other challenges we had to face was to counteract the customers’ negative perception of Aerolíneas Argentinas. Our job was to bring positivity to the fore, highlight the brand as a national asset and disassociate it from any political issues. We developed the brand’s value proposition with this in mind through co-creation sessions with the client team.
After this phase, we created Aerolíneas Argentinas’s visual identity without changing the logo. We discovered that one element from the logo was very significant for both internal and external audiences – so the whole visual system was based on the iconic eagle in the brand’s logo. We created a new tone of voice, sonic branding and tagline: “Amar Volar” (meaning “Love Flying”). We also revitalized the brand´s loyalty program – which offers added benefits and services for its most loyal customers.
Launched in October 2019, the rebrand was lauded by the internal Aerolíneas Argentinas team who felt that their passion, expertise and legacy was well represented and conveyed all the attributes of a future-facing brand.
