Cathay Pacific - Art Map Project

Cathay Pacific - Art Map Project

Cathay Pacific has launched a new Art Map project which has been described by the airline as an “innovative marriage of travel data and bespoke art”. In this creative and original customer appreciation campaign, the airline uses route data collected from the flights of Marco Polo Club members to create for them a bespoke birthday gift: a beautiful visual representation of their year of journeys with Cathay Pacific and/or Cathay Dragon.

Optimizing passenger data to truly personalize the travel journey and display intimate understanding of personal preference has long been a goal of airlines and other travel-related businesses. While the industry is getting better at knowing passengers, predicting behaviour and presenting well-tailored offers and services, many of these initiatives have fallen short on expectation.

But the Art Map is simple in execution (using only passenger route information, birth date and email), non-intrusive, beautiful and touching. Most importantly though, this digital artwork is easy to share on social media, through a selection of clickable icons.

On their birthday, Marco Polo Club members are invited to visit a micro-site where they are greeted with a happy birthday message and some information about the art they are about to witness. They then watch as their year of journeys are plotted onto a world map, then traced with brushstrokes that are inspired by contemporary Chinese art, and intentionally reminiscent of Cathay Pacific’s iconic brushwing brand identity .

Finally the world map fades away leaving only the destination points and connecting brush strokes on a white canvas. At the bottom left corner of the artwork, the member’s name will appear, as well as the date of creation.

”Rather than send a mass-produced impersonal birthday greeting, the company wanted to make a more meaningful connection with its members,” said Elaine Lee, manager of loyalty marketing at Cathay Pacific. “Artmap creates some real emotional value for our members. Each artmap is hosted on a mini-site, where members witness their piece painting itself before their eyes, elegantly illustrating their year of travel. If they choose, members can then print a hi-resolution copy of their birthday artwork for framing.

Cathay Pacific worked closely with McCann Worldgroup , loyalty experts ICLP and Hong Kong artist Henry Chu on this campaign, which has been widely praised by marketing and creative branding publications such as Marketing Interactive , Creativity Online , Campaign Brief Asia and many more.