Resurrecting airline names & liveries

[Mooncrest]

Question for the legal brains among you. Supposing I wanted to start an airline and use a well known name and colour scheme from the past. What steps would I have to take to secure the identity I wanted ? For example, if I wanted to call my company Northeast Airlines with the attendant bright yellow and black colours (the old UK outfit, not the US 727 op) I suppose I'd have to approach British Airways and make an offer to buy the name and copyrights etc. I'd be interested to know.

I'm not really planning on doing this as I have neither the cash nor the business acumen but I'm a sentimental old nit and it would be nice to see a few old classic names knocking around once more. Dan- Air, British Eagle, Caledonian, even Flying Colours...Great name and paint job. Why the hell did they go green and blue and call themselves JMC ??

I digress but does anyone have any idea how these old names could be resurrected ? Ta :ok:

[colegate]

To get the British Caledonian or British United name you would have to negotiate with BA as they bought these names along with several others in 1987. (The others include Silver City, Transair, Morton, Britavia, Air Charter, Channel Air Bridge, Airwork and Hunting Clan). To use Dan-Air you would have to deal with BA.

British Eagle went bust in 1968 and theoretically anyone could use that name. You certainly would not have to pay any royalties to anyone. It was a great airline although its finances were always hopeless.

You could always try and revive the Channel Airways name. That was the airline owned by Jack Jones which went bust in 1974. It was unashamedly Britain's worst airline ever. No customer service, very few customers, worst aircraft configurations ever (6 abreast in a 1-11, 7 abreast in a Trident), no punctuality, serviceable aircraft a rarity, few staff but endless ambitious expansion plans. They even planned to operate the 707 to America.



To be really cheeky you could ask BA if you could use the name BOAC. If was certainly a great airline with a fine world wide reputation. Never really made any money though.

But ultimately it does not matter what you call it, it is what it does. Starting an airline is a fine graveyard for most people. I suspect you would be better off buying some memorabilia and looking at them in your dreams.

[Mooncrest]

Thanks for your contribution Colegate. Interesting to note how BA features prominently in the list of faded glory ! Mind you, I expect the name Caledonian is now owned by Thomas Cook.

[GROUNDHOG]

Or of course you can go on to the Companies House website, enquire if the name is available and register it yourself if it is as a limited company and then you will own your own airline!! Apart from owning and buying the name you will need to file dormant accounts each year and the upside is you will be one of the few airlines not making a loss ( allegedly).

[egnxema]

Great question! And one that I have similarly wondered when sat at my desk pipedreaming the hugely successful airline that I will manage (NOT).

Theoretically, what if I wanted to start a UK airline with a name that is used by a regional carrier, either previously, or currently, in another part of the world. eg Jet Airways - in India, can names be duplicated like that?

There are some pretty naff airline names about - especially the new LoCo's. What names can you come up with that would have a good sound, look, and marketing use?

I had thought that if you could use ONE in the name, JetONE, or simply "ONE", you could have great fun with the marketing tags. And while we mention marketing tags - "Come on, Let's fly!" - how naff is that!!

:ok:

Mooncrest,

And just for the sake of nostalgia, whatever your Leeds based airline will be called, your EMA rival could well be "Orion" - great little airline, strong image, strong customer loyalty if i remember.

:ok:

[PPRuNe Pop]

You COULD see if a name is available, and the liklihood is that it will be but you would have to be ready for a fight. BA own the intellectual property rights of many airlines and you will not get any of them. Other failed airlines, or those bought out, are similarly protected. I tried many years ago with a very famous name and it cost money that would blow your mind. I didn't have to pay in the end because of legal imcompetency (not accepted) but I didn't pay anyway.

Ask yourself one question. Why are the names not flying now?

[GW76]

Im sure BA still hold the rights to the name Caledonian- done as part of the deal to sell it off.

[jmc757]

Caledonian traded as an airline years after BA sold it off, up until Thomas Cook bought Inspirations. Surely Thomas Cook own the name? Didnt they get a little :mad: off a few years back when that joker thought he was going to buy all the Delta Tristars and fly Scotland-USA calling it "Caledonian Wings"?

[Mooncrest]

PPRuNE Pop,

Northeast is the one I'm really interested in as it was far and away the biggest LBA operator in the early to mid seventies with three based bright yellow Viscounts...happy days ! I was only about three or four years old at the time but I seem to remember BA decided to re-brand its regional subsidiaries under the BA banner and do away with the individual identities like Cambrian, Scottish and Channel Islands and good old Northeast. I don't know if profitability or otherwise had anything to do with the disappearance of these names.

BTW it would be my dream to purchase a Viscount 800, get it flying and get it painted in Northeast colours...and then get sued by BA. :ok:

[jabird]

egnxema,

"Theoretically, what if I wanted to start a UK airline with a name that is used by a regional carrier, either previously, or currently, in another part of the world. eg Jet Airways - in India, can names be duplicated like that?"

I think this would come down to the level of trademarking the airline in question used. For example, Jet Blue objected to Flyblu, who are now called Flywho (chuckle, but there's another thread for that!). Even if Jet Blue don't operate any transatlantic services (never say never though), both airlines would operate to the same three Florida cities (even if to different airports in some cases), so there could have been plenty of opportunity for confusion. I'm not sure if Flybe objected either, especially as both airlines would have had BHX bases. Blue 1 don't seem to have had the same problem though - I would guess that Blue, like Easy, is too generic a word, but Flyblu and Jet Blue were seen as being similar - three letter prefixes, both aviation related etc.

Virgin operate three (at present, more on the way?) airlines in entirely different territories - I assume each one using the name under licence, but doubt any other airline could use the name anywhere - except presumably a regional carrier serving the Virgin islands?

There is a Ryan International Airlines in the US - not sure if they've been going longer than FR, and again if Family names can be protected in the same way? Presumably regions, such as Southwest / Air Southwest, Eastern, etc are not so easy to trademark? US Airways & AA, Indian Airlines and Air India, even BA and BMI must cause a certain amount of confusion to some passengers, especially anyone making a hurried journey to an unfamiliar multi-terminal airport.

[egnxema]

As a child in the 70's I lived 2 miles from the Runway at EMA in Castle Donington - in my mind I can still here the high pitched squeel of the Viscount's engines as I stood on the outdoor spectator balcony at EMA and watching the BMA Viscounts, I also remember the really strong smell of aviation fuel, something that is different these days - unless my nose has just got used to it.

[master slug]

Seems to me you are a person of taste.

That was one cool colour scheme.

what about the old classic Cout Line. A
nice Pink or Yellow Tristar.
long live Cambrian, Northeast or was it BKS.

so say's the slug ...............

[Eric T Cartman]

A defunct airline name may be the property of it's new owner but it's R/T callsign is not. If it has not been used for a certain period, I believe 60 days, it can be allocated again to any applicant. Thus, Caledonian is now used by what was Classair, flying out of Prestwick to Stornoway & Belfast Eglington.

[MarkD]

Might be nice to see AC let the Canadian Airlines name/scheme go... fat chance of it happening though!

[Lite]

I've always found the problem when companies resurrect brands, is that a lot of people have very bad memories of the original company.

For example, you mention the name PAN AM to me, and despite thinking of the airline who flew worldwide & the famous flying meatball, I think of the images when the company went bankrupt & flying on one of their 747s from Fort Lauderdale to Gatwick I think it was, with appaling customer service, with morale, like the airplane, in tatters a year or so before.

[surely not]

I think BA has control of the 'British Caledonian' name, but I'm reasonably sure that the 'Caledonian' name was sold on along with the airline when BA decided to get out of its pure charter operation.