Thomas Cook Airlines - New Year New Design

Thomas Cook Airlines - New Year New Design

To kick-off the New Year, Thomas Cook has announced plans to create a consistent brand identity for all four of its constituent airlines - Condor (Germany), and Thomas Cook Airlines UK, Scandinavia and Benelux.

For the first time in the history of the group, one design is going to unite all four brands. A corporate announcement stated that the corporate design would have a “more bold look” with a darker grey chosen than the one that was used before.

Changing colour tones is not the most significant part of this development, rather the airline group has decided that marketing campaigns will no longer solely concentrate on the 100 leisure destinations that the different airlines fly to. Instead there will be more of an emphasis on “aviation images that make the flying experience come alive more.”

In other words, Thomas Cook Airlines is moving from functional marketing messages (‘we’re a way for you to reach lots of great holiday destinations’) to ones that actually emphasise the brand (‘choose us over other airlines.’)

According to Director of Customer Experience Rainer Kröpke, “as an airline, we would like to bring our customers closer to the fascination of flying and the experience of our excellent product. The holiday starts with us from the point you get on board. “

Starting with the German and UK markets, a series of different marketing initiatives are bringing the new positioning to life. For example, over the past month Thomas Cook Airlines UK has been running a ‘goodbye Grey Britain’ campaign.

Different images show a couple on top of a Thomas Cook plane with ‘Goodbye Grey Britain” followed by ‘Hello’ and the name of the destination (e.g. ‘Goodbye Grey Britain, Hello Las Vegas’).

The Goodbye Grey Britain campaign focused in particular around what the British Media calls ‘Sunshine Saturday’ , the day in January (Jan 7th) when holiday companies see a boost in bookings at a time when the nights are long, the days cold and Christmas is an increasingly distant memory.

In December, parent company Thomas Cook ran a UK TV campaign that featured both a gay kiss and gay parents. The travel company said that the ad, entitled ‘You want, we do’, “reflects a modern population” , and in addition to a TV is supported by snapchat style filters.