Citilink gets aggressive ahead of growth

BUDGET AIRLINE   GARUDA INDONESIA

Indonesia - Citilink has rolled out a major brand revamp to run throughout 2012, as it prepares to spin-off as a wholly-owned subsidiary of Garuda Indonesia from April this year.

The new entity will operate under the name PT Citilink Indonesia. It aims to participate in the fast growing low-cost airline market, providing same "quality, safety and security as the Garuda Indonesia group".

The revamp kicked-off with the aircraft changing its corporate colour to green from red late last year and introducing new aircraft livery which is now on its new Airbus A320 aircraft and existing Boeing 737 fleet.

Citilink's brand strategy will continue to roll out in the next few months, revealing its new aircraft interiors, ticket offices, cabin crew uniforms, website design and look.

The airline has launched an aggressive marketing plan using print, outdoor and digital executions and is running three ad campaigns every month, this year, done by its agency Fortune.

This is also supported by a marketing and communication programme to attract customers, with the goal of becoming the top low-cost carrier in the country.

There has been a significant spike in marketing budgets for the brand this year. Without divulging figures, Con Korfiatis (pictured), vice president, Citilink, in an interview to Marketing, said it's "easily seven to eight times of what we spent last year."

"Form hardly any ad campaigns last year to three campaigns every month in 2012- we are consistently communicating to our audience about our brand positioning that Citilink is a low cost airline of Garuda Indonesia and brings with itself the same high operating standards and the level of customer service."

"Garuda is the most trusted airline in the country and we hope to bring the same promise as far as the quality is concerned."

The Indonesian travel market, in terms of passengers, is growing at 20% annually. The domestic market saw 60 million passengers last year, a number that is expected to go up to 105 million by 2015.

"Given the growth, there will be a need to double the current airline capacity and this will result in growth in the aviation industry, at large," he added.

By the end of 2012, Citilink will be double the size of its network now, given the expected addition of A-320s to its fleet as well as increase in frequency of the routes it currently covers.

Citilink is also in the process of bolstering its presence in the market, looking to grow the headcount to 180 (excluding pilot and crew) from the current 100.

"We will have a full management in place by April this year so that we hit the ground running once Citilink becomes a wholly-owned subsidiary of Garuda." 

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