More thoughts on the new AA livery
So, it’s been a couple of days now and I’ve had time to reflect more and time to look at the new AA logo and livery again with fresh eyes. Here are my final thoughts:
1) I think they *nailed* it with the silver paint for the fuselage.
2) I think the “blade” aka the stylized aircraft tail next to the name is growing on me some but I still think what is supposed to represent an eagle’s head actually implies a star more. It’s a touch too stylized, in my opinion. That said, it’s OK and I think that it is strong enough to be associated with the name going forward. As people see it, they’ll tag it as AA.
3) Hate the tail more than I did yesterday. I simply think it is way too generic and has no connection to the history or branding of American Airlines.
4) As much as I think the billboard title on the fuselage was absolutely the right way to go . . . I just don’t think it stands out enough against the silver fuselage. It needs a different color, I think.
It’s interesting to me that when asked if this branding would be redone in the event of a merger, Tom Horton said he didn’t think so. Well, I think it would be. I think you would see the silver paint retained. I think it’s possible the logo would be retained in some form. But I think there are two things you would see the US Airways crew change immediately.
The tail of the aircraft would be cleaned up considerably. The billboard “American” title on the fuselage would be made bolder. And the fact that Tom Horton’s good friend Doug Parker hasn’t paid a public compliment to AA over the re-branding kind of indicates that they are, at best, lukewarm to the concept. US Airways did issue this statment:
“We applaud our friends at American as the new brand elements and livery mark the culmination of a significant amount of work and coordination, and clearly those efforts have produced a compelling result.”
Make of that what you will.
Does AA need a new brand? Yes. Did it need one *today*? Nope. There were interim solutions that could have been employed. Does this new brand move them forward? Logo wise, yes, I think they’re there mostly. Does the livery do anything for them? No, I think if you parked that aircraft at a major european hub it would be lost in a sea of Euro Styling and particularly with those colors. Heck, I kind of wonder how it would stand out taxiing through Atlanta’s airport. I see a livery done by committee rather than a leader and its notable that they say this has been in the works for 2 years.
To misquote a certain financial analyst at JP Morgan Chase: “Really Tom? Is this all you’ve got?”
It’s quite common for a company that has filed Chapter 11 to rebrand itself, whether during the bankruptcy period or shortly afterward.
United went through a rebranding that started in 2004, in the middle of the trip through bankruptcy. That’s when it went from the battleship gray and navy livery to the white and blue livery. Also, the tulip U was modified, going from red and blue, either on a gray or two-tone blue background, to white on a blue background, as well as a change of font.
I seem to recall that within 6 months of the introduction of the new livery, Terminal 1 at O’Hare had been remodeled to reflect the modified branding.
Admittedly, the new branding and livery is not the home run that senior management was expecting. I had heard rumors that the new livery was going to be retro. I took that to mean a modern take on the lightning bolt livery that AA used until 1968.
However, AA was included in a list of the 10 most hated companies in America. A fresh brand in livery was indeed needed.
Further, it would make no sense to introduce the 777-300 into service with the updated interior and the old livery. It makes even less sense to take delivery of the Airbus narrowbodies in some sort of painted version of the old, bare-metal look, assuming that AA had not been discharged from Chapter 11 before the first delivery. Remember how the A300s, which were painted in a color called gray mist, looked horribly out of place, when parked next to Boeing, McDonnell Douglas, and Fokker aircraft.
I think the logo is reasonably good, although it isn’t a home run, but rather, a stand-up double. But, the tail looks like the red and white striped jerseys now worn by the U.S. national soccer team. The look doesn’t work for the soccer team. It’s worse on the aircraft tails.
Hopefully, AA sees the error of its ways, as BA did with the “World Tails” and comes up with something better.
United’s color was a mess ever since the 1990’s…
By contract, AA was a world design icon.
Tampering with world brands calls for finesse. The new look is anything but. It is redolent of a minor post-Soviet nation’s bid to capture world attention with a hodge-podge of crap that the Minister of Transport’s girlfriend came up with after reading Vogue.
To dump a world brand is bad enough. To do it amid corporate straits is worse. To replace it with something vaguely third-world-me-too is a national affront. Watch developments to see how this disaster moves into the textbooks as a definition of corporate hubris!
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Incidentally, in the 1960s AA flew BAC One-Elevens which had aluminum foil applied to the fuselages to cover up a beige primed section. If it was possible then, what makes it impossible for 787s now?
Foil such as you described would be very expensive to apply and more so to maintain. Other airlines applied it now and then and generally dropped it as an idea in very short order because of maintainability.