benchmark report
airline marketing
interactive amenity kit
flying lab LUFTHANSA To celebrate its new service from Frankfur t to San Jose, the gateway to the Silicon Valley, Lufthansa treated passengers and select press to an immersive experience. Taking place at 10,000 metres above the ground the Lufthansa FlyingLab gave guests the chance to try out new technology, hear presentations and talks from specially invited guest speakers and network with each other. Passengers boarding the FlyingLab in Frankfur t were first of all greeted with a gate par ty that featured funky seating, vir tual reality experiences and more.Once in the air, the Flying Lab continued to surprise. With the aid of a specially set-up inflight network to stream video content to passengers’ mobile devices, the airline executed a live onboard conference with speakers at the front of the plane, delivering real-time coverage to passengers AUG 2016 ISSUE
EMIRATES throughout. The speakers included Natanael Sijanta, director of marketing communications at automotive giant Mercedes Benz, as well as Heiko Hebig, the head of par tnerships for photo social network Instagram. Samsung technology, including S2 Tablets and Gear VR vir tual reality head-sets were on board for passengers to try. Lufthansa’s aim is for the FlyingLab to be something that can be rolled out around major route launches and events. According to Torsten Wingenter, head of digital innovation at Lufthansa, the airline is already considering running a lab around New York Fashion Week as well as Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. As a result, the FlyingLab website includes a call for par tners, as well as technology vendors who would like to showcase their products to a plane full of social media influencers on a future flight.
Emirates has debuted what it describes as “the world’s first interactive amenity kit in economy class” . Using the Blippar augmented reality app, passengers can scan on their kits with their smar tphones and unlock immersive content including a customized music playlist, a digital doodling book (coloring books for adults are all the rage these days!), health and well-being travel tips, and access to the Emirates app where they can post comments to the airline (video ). Each kit has a unique mix of content and is designed to be useful long after the journey. The six different designs of the kits are inspired by the six regions in Emirates’ global network: Australasia, Latin America, Middle East, Africa, Europe and the Far East. The designs incorporate the colours and patterns of each of these regions. The Middle East design features Arabic calligraphy by UAEbased ar tist, Tagelsir Hassan. Emirates is
offering the kits to passengers on long-haul flights to Auckland, Sydney and Brisbane. The timing of an Augmented Reality kit couldn’t have been more timely, with Pokémon GO calling everyone’s attention to the possibilities of augmented and vir tual reality. Emirates has also found a way to keep customers engaged after the journey by offering new content that customers can unlock after their trip by scanning the kit again. Amenity kits build an airline’s brand , and amenity kits in the economy cabin are a rare and prized passenger treat. Emirates already offers premium cabin customers amenity kits with luxury cosmetics, and offers children kits which prove popular with parents too. But by introducing a digital and interactive element to an economy kit, the airline has tapped into something special.
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EXPERIENTIAL SOCIAL DIGITAL TV, PRINT, OOH