Do you remember the feeling of getting on your first flight as a kid. The noises, lights, sounds, feelings were all consuming, and Virgin Atlantic with their new advertising agency (from AMV BBDO) brings back the child-like excitement that we all feel when stepping on-board an aircraft.
Filmed aboard a fictitious 787, the 1-minute-long advert takes us away from the hum-drum of normal life to a sky-high wonderland where everyone’s imagination takes them to a theme park of a flight.
The advert includes a Beatles-Style super-surrealist approach to flight, from ball pens in the cargo hold, to ice-creams from the air vents made from engine-ingested rainbows. While trade descriptions could have a field day, the energy, delight and surprise is what Virgin Atlantic builds its brand on.
In a relentless marketing sphere where airlines have to create a point of difference, this airline has managed to create this in the ice-cream bucket load.
The airline is now headed up by a new head of brand, Michael Stephens, who moved to the carrier from Ted Baker, and this new advert is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to his stamp on the carrier.
The airline relatively soon will also reveal a new interior for their new A350s, have their new A330-200 interiors coming online later this year, and have also aligned themselves with Virgin Holidays to offer a combined approach to promoting the Virgin experience. The move doesn’t mean Virgin Atlantic and Virgin Holidays will share the shame marketing platform. “We are still very determined to create individual brand identities for both Holidays and Atlantic,” says Stephens.
We look forward to seeing how this new advertising approach disseminates in to a new brand image for the carrier. In the meantime, we are certainly going to enjoy this Flash Gordon’ style advertising campaign and hope our next flight with them includes rainbow ice-cream on tap from our air vent.
TheDesignAir 