benchmark report
airline marketing
experiential
the invictus games
coffee university
VIRGIN ATLANTIC The Invictus Games , founded by Britain’s Prince Harry (himself a military man), is an annual spor ting event designed to suppor t rehabilitation and a wider understanding and respect for wounded, injured and sick Servicemen and women. The games and the stories of the athletes that par ticipate have garnered increasing notoriety since the inaugural event in 2014. As the official carrier for the UK team, Virgin Atlantic set about the task of ferrying the whole group and multitudes of carefully-packed, specialized equipment over to Orlando on a series of flights from various UK airpor ts. At a time when many airlines are under scrutiny for lack of PRM services (Passengers with Reduced Mobility), Virgin Atlantic saw the Invictus team transpor t operation as an oppor tunity to highlight its commitment to creating great flying experiences for CRMs at all times. JULY 2016 ISSUE
UNITED “We have dedicated teams who really want to assist our customers with disabilities – it’s a vocation rather than a job,” Gerladine Lundy, Virgin’s passenger accessibility manager told Runway Girl Network in a dedicated story . “… We can offer a bespoke service tailored to the individual. Also we’ve spent a lot of time in training relaying the message of what it feels like to travel when you have additional requirements.” Virgin made two touching videos about the effor t posted to YouTube on May 5th and May 12th . Both show just how carefully the airline planned these journeys and the care that went into every encounter. Repor ters were invited onto the tarmac to document the excitement of the farewells, by and this May 7th Facebook post Virgin Atlantic elicited over 200 reactions.
Like lost luggage and overly chatty seat mates, lousy inflight coffee has been a given among many frequent fliers. And though a handful of carriers have tried to perk up their caffeinated offerings by par tnering with high-end, gourmet coffee brands over the years, for the most par t the industry’s approach to inflight coffee seemed to echo the sentiments if worldrenowned coffee addict David Lynch who once said: “Even bad coffee is better than no coffee.” So when United’s merger with Continental heralded the end of United’s hugelysuccessful par tnership with premium coffee purveyor Starbucks, coffee aficionados the world over were understandably concerned. And though the coffee United offered in the interim was rumored to be almost worse than no coffee at all, the good news
for so-called “java junkies” is that United took action in the form of a clever “Coffee University” promotion with Italian coffee roasting powerhouse Illy. As par t of this campaign, United sent key management staff to Illy’s Coffee University at the legendary Culinary Institute of America in St. Helena, California to learn better tasting cup of coffee inflight. They also flew dozens of journalists to Illy headquar ters in Trieste, Italy in May for a chance to witness Illy coffee-making magic for themselves. This hands-on activation has cer tainly succeeded in brewing up some great PR. A number of popular aviation sites, like Harriet Baskas’s popular Stuck at the Airport blog and the award-winning Runway Girl Network , published stories about United’s deep-roasted partnership with Illy .
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EXPERIENTIAL SOCIAL DIGITAL TV, PRINT, OOH
