Virgin Australia it is!
 

The worst kept secret is out! According to flight global the decision has been made.

Virgin Blue in final stages to re-brand as Virgin Australia - Wings Down Under

According to flight global and Mr. Hat about 8 months ago..:}

Wish I could be bothered digging up the post!

Looks like you got the name correct Mr Hat, so are you going to have a go and guess the colours?

Where does this put them in regards to the inability to use the brand name "Virgin" outside of OZ - as decreed by Singapore Airlines?

This "legal requirement" has caused them to use the Pac Blue brand or VA brand anytime they depart our shores. How will this affect the 777 operation or their ability to run the 330's out of the country?

A few weeks ago JB was on Skynews and he said it would be great to have only one brand, but two would also work. So if the use of 'Virgin' outside of Australia is still blocked then we have Virgin Australia for all domestic ops and V Australia covering all international ops including Pac Blue. All aircraft would be painted the same, just the name on the side would be different.

About time I got something right on this forum but I'm not singing victory yet!

I have a sinking feeling its going to be bloody white and red but thats just based on what everybody has seen thus far. I really hope not. Does it turn your head? No. This is a very unique opportunity to turn heads lets hope they get it right! You would have to expect purple to be in there somewhere but the base colour well.. I don't know.

One thing I do know is that uniform branding is important so I hope its one and not two names.

How about green and gold for a colour scheme?

Perhaps a nice payrise and positive round of enterprise bargaining will accompany the new name and colour scheme ?
What about red and white stripes on the aircaft like a barbers pole ? Or a beige/brown colour to match the colour of the West Australian desert seeing that expansions are taking place there ?
Will there be the same silly flying ladies stickered to the fwd fueselage on the aircraft Mr Hat ?
Or maybe an all pink paint work ? QF painted a Dash 8 in an alomost all pink livery and from a distance it looks like my Bull Mastiff with a hard-on, very interesting !

The flying lady i saw on the 330 i thought was impressive. Thats my taste though.

Virgin Atlantic have the flying lady similar to vb's current one.

I would suspect it will be the case. What will always be in place will be a filter. I.e they are not going to pay for another type rating if you are a poor performer on multiple fronts. Thats how I interpret it anyway.

What would be really great is if we got a different colour scheme to that of qantas. The V Aus scheme in my opinion is a blatant rip off off the rat's look.

Add to that the new uniform with the RM's, we need our own direction not a rebranding of qantas with virgin 'flair'

This is only my humble view of what is to come (perhaps) world wide.
http://www.sailinganarchy.com/fringe/2011/virgin.png

Steak.

Well, considering Virgin is Ansett by another name these days, all white with the southern cross on the fin and rudder is an absolute certainty!

tootle pip!

All the options sound so very boring. What happened to the Virgin 'flair' (previous references to the let's stage a hijack stunt notwithstanding :E)? Paint them purple and add some funky lighting, call it Shazaam Airlines, do something to escape the 'we've gone respectable and look exactly like our competition 'cos we're nearly the same now we're a grown up airline and part of the establishment' image...

I never thought I'd say it (having found the initial Funky Virgin image nauseatingly try-hard) but they're looking very establishment. Your choice, Aussie consumer; Boring Airlines, Boringer Airlines or two We-Don't -Give-A-:mad:-About-You Airlines. Maybe I'll just drive and catch the scenery :}...

There's a rumour about an anouncement about Pac Bro this week, maybe they'll become V Aus...:O That'll be the 20 odd aircraft JB was talking about...

Not forgetting a sprinkling of polka dots representing the up-turned eyes of the millions of flies seen at night when flying over the desert.:ok:

I think you people are missing the point. The Virgin ******* branding people don't want a product that is visually very different to QANTAS. It's harder to raise brand awareness for something that's 'different'. They want to portray a product that is similar but subtly different. Thus people know what to expect, which is comforting.

I would bet London to a brick that Virgin ********* will eventually, down the track, be advertising that they are more Australian than the competition (more Australian than the spirit of Australia) through spruiking on-shoring.

Forget the idea of Jet* being re-branded as the new QANTAS. My bet is that JB is manoeuvring V to become the new Q. They may be poles apart for us in the know, but to Berty businessman the product will be very similar, and besides he remembers reading something about V being more Australian than the competition through on-shoring, which everyone knows also makes them safer than the competition (which is also comforting).

Fair enough, good point. If that is the plan, they will succeed nicely. They're certainly moving away from the initial funky LCC thing.

It just seems a pity when they've got all those lovely aircraft to paint, I adore clever airline paint jobs.

I would have thought that if they wanted to be truly Aussier they would need to drop the Virgin name completely, IMO in the pubic's eyes it is irrevocably associated with Richard Branson. Is that part of the plan too?

Branson is owns 25% of the airline and stipulated that the "Virgin" brand must be maintained in the rebranding.

I'm sure JB (and the board) does not want to spend millions on this exercise to end up with something that looks just like Qantas.

What??? Harder to raise brand awareness for something that is different??

As a marketing advisor, you certainly make a good pilot, Psycho...

It's all about "point of difference" old boy. Why would someone change brand for something that is ostensibly the same. Where is the incentive. It's marketing 101 - provide an offering with a point(s) of difference to be able to drag the punter away form their usual spending habits and choice of brand. "Subtle" does not break deep seated buying patterns.

What about David Jones and Myer? Their images and branding are almost identical. Coles and Woolies don't differentiate much either.

Executive managements outrageous salaries and bonuses don't differentiate much either. And let's face it, isn't that what really counts ??

One word, FAMILIARITY. Familiarity is comforting, there are many customers who will purchase a particular product from a particular company simply because it is familiar to them; Because they know what to expect, even if they don't like the company. If you can supply a product that is similar to your competition then you effectively piggy back off their branding. Then the small differences become the main selling point. Straight away you have the attention of the budget concious and accounting departments, as well as anyone who is unhappy with your rival. If you can claim to be a better corporate citizen than an Australian icon, then you've sealed the deal. Either that or the icon buys you out.

It's the same in the corporate advertising nature of politics. In 2007 Labor won an election by being very much like the Government on virtually every policy, but with one simple difference, no work choices.

When McDonalds spent a zillion advertising the new 'Mighty Angus' burgers, sales went through the roof and Hungry Jack's were suffering. So what did they come up with? The 'Angry Angus' :rolleyes:.

Switch on your TV in the morning and channel 7's 'Sunrise' program follows the exact same format as Channel 9's morning program.

As someone with significant real world (not armchair) experience in marketing and branding, psycho joe is correct for the most part. Brand development and management is all about initial display of similarities in comparison with successful opponents, with one or two adjustments to create points of differentiation (unique selling points). If a rebrand takes place that's too different from what's existing in the market, the result will be loss of market share as consumers feel less assured and confident about the product quality that they're to receive. The points of differentiation are what is pushed through marketing communications, but it's the similarities that make up the vast basis of a brand in order to display solidarity, reliability and familiarity.

What Virgin Australia will have on its side is that it's a brand extension, not an entirely new brand, and so the level of brand awareness and recall in the audience is already in existence, which in theory should allow for greater differentiation from the competition. However, the fact remains that given the current monopoly on full service airlines domestically by QF, the only way to successfully compete will be to subtly but widely push similarities while driving home the USPs as focal points within communications.

FINALLY! We see something...:D


http://tapa.tk/mu/3ce221bb-323b-71b4.jpg

http://tapa.tk/mu/3ce221bb-3250-50d0.jpg

http://tapa.tk/mu/3ce221bb-3261-1c3b.jpg

And how did we get these photos??...dodgy! Looks good tho.

This aircraft is actually already flying revenue services, was thinking they would mabye keep this under wraps. Found this on airliners.net

http://yssyforum.net/board/attachmen...6&d=1302949065

Fair enough.

Are you sure you found them on airliners.net?

I' didn't think they accepted dodgy mobile phone photos :rolleyes:

Good god! They've managed to put a 737 overhead panel in an A330 cockpit...YOU BAAASTARDS!!!

They are from airliners.net, but not the photo section. They are in the forum section.

FlightGlobal found this image to be trademarked (black and white as that is all that is shown on the trademarks page):


http://www.flightglobal.com/blogs/wi...181-123467.jpg

Photo: Virgin Australia logo revealed - Wings Down Under

The question is - is it the real one, or a decoy? JB is not an unintelligent man...

VH-YFC an 800 is at CHC about to be painted in the new colour scheme :cool:

Think you will find it is the virgin part which forms that trademark and the Australia part is tagged on as a development to the trademark I.e still to be developed!!

Trade mark site shows the trade mark is for the Virgin tailplane image and the word "Australia".

Looks completely original, except for this:
http://www.spafax.com/images/case-st...in-america.jpg

Hope they didn't pay anyone for the logo design....

Looks like a pre-schooler could have done it...

Keep it in black and white I say. Looks good!

Winglets

exactly what I was saying - only the word and not a final image or colour scheme to match just yet... Jb needs something to unveil afterall can't give it all away.

Tail has been trade marked with the word.

IP Australia only makes black and white copies of logos available.