Flight stimulator

Getting in first delivered Singapore Airlines a marketing coup when local and international media fell over themselves to give the most column inches and airtime to the arrival of its new baby the A830. SIA maximized the coverage with a dose of CSR, a pinch of glamour, an appeal to national pride and whole lot of pressure on its brand new agency. Greg Waldron reports.

Hype, hyperbole and hysteria, the arrival of Singapore Airline's spanking new super plane, the A380 on October 17 this year was given the sort of rock star welcome usually reserved for, well, rockstars. Deservedly the world's biggest plane was a global news story which brought its first owner, Singapore Airlines, the kind of media coverage that would cause any brand custodian salivate.

The footage of the landing and its runway procession through a guard of honour of spurting water canons was played on an almost continuous loop on local television media and the plane's arrival was hailed as a national event.

This was just the beginning of the blanket coverage the A380 and Singapore Airlines received. Pre and post arrival publicity was exhaustive and stretched well beyond news to encompass hours of TV magazine style programs detailing the birth of Airbus's A380 and featuring lush sweeping shots of the fit-out, with special attention given to the section of the plane most SIA passengers will never see, the first class sleeper cabins. There was even a documentary about the building and opening of Changhi Airport's third terminal which will accommodate the new plane. 

The media cheerleading for the A380 delivered a massive marketing coup for SIA in a country that loves to be first and it reached every demographic segment in Singapore from the heartlanders to the high net worthers as it was covered in freesheets to the broadsheets, the business press and most broadcast properties.

SIA taking charge of the first A380 was seen as an uplifting positive news story and a coup not only for the national carrier, but for the nation. While there was some analysis of whether or not the plane would earn its keep and whether expensive seats, or beds, in the (Beyond) First Class cabin would be occupied on all flights, it was overwhelmingly smooth skies for SIA in all media coverage.

In fact for a plane long derided as a white elephant and an icon of European industrial hubris, it is difficult to get anyone to say anything negative about the A380, for the time being flown exclusively by SIA. Owing to industrial delays the plane missed its arrival flight by two years, and some estimates (Airbus declines to give numbers) put the development costs in the region of €20 billion (S$43 billion). At press time the plane has only 193 firm orders and commitments. The CEO of Airbus's parent, EADS, reportedly said for the company to breakeven on its investment it needs to sell more than a previously given number of 420.

First flyer advantage

For SIA the A380 is perhaps the biggest single marketing coup in the airline's history.  Aviation experts are also optimistic about the plane, and the advantages that will accrue to airlines which operate it.

SIA's second and third A380s arrive in January 2008, and the fourth in April. Its fifth will arrive before rivals Qantas and Emirates receive their first A380s in August 2008. British Airways will not receive its first A380 until 2012, and Cathay Pacific has yet to even order the plane. SIA's additional planes will allow it to offer A380 service on the lucrative Sydney-Singapore-London sector. The fourth will fly the Singapore-Tokyo route. In the coming years SIA will receive a total of 19 A380s, the highest among any Asian carrier. From a marketing perspective, aviation experts say SIA's 10-month A380 monopoly offers the airline a tremendous edge, showing the airline as innovative, modern, and luxurious.

"In Europe during the weeks leading up to the launch the media gave blanket coverage to SIA and its wonderful new product. This has really promoted SIA as the airline everyone wants to fly on because they've got the aircraft, and it will be the only aircraft for a while.  In terms of market positioning this has been spectacularly successful," Peter Harbison, executive chairman of Australia's Centre for Asia Pacific Aviation says. 

Dealing with the hub caps

Huang Cheng Eng, executive vice president marketing & regions for SIA, outlines the SIA's business case for the A380. "The impact of the A380 on SIA is very positive for a number of reasons. We fly into a number of congested airports that lack new slots. Examples of these are London, Tokyo, and even Sydney. The A380 allows us to increase capacity without increasing frequency or slots. Our A380 has 471 seats, 96 more than our second biggest plane, the 747-400."  

Huang's comments echo Airbus's rationale for the A380: major hub airports will get more congested as more people fly, and airlines need extra capacity to take advantage of limited slots. Airbus predicts demand for 1,600 very large aircraft over the next 20 years, of which 400 will be freighters. It is confident of the A380 winning 50% of this market. 

Airbus's view of the importance of hubs varies with that touted by its American rival Boeing, maker of the venerable 747. Boeing reckons the future lies not in hubs, but in smaller aircraft serving secondary cities; its 250-seat 787 Dreamliner has been developed to service just such routes. Both, however, have nodded to the other's argument: Airbus's A350XWB is a direct rival to the Dreamliner, and Boeing's 747-8 is targeted at airlines who need a big hub plane, but not as big as the A380. For its part, SIA has ordered for 20 787s and 20 A350XWBs.

And the A380 may not be as revolutionary as it seems. A Factiva search on the A380 reveals readers tend to compare the birth of the A380 with that of the 747 in the late sixties. This comparison is bunk, Torbjorn Karlsson, a 20-year industry veteran who heads the aerospace practice at executive search firm Heidrick & Struggles, says. "The 747 represented a huge capacity jump from the planes flying in the sixties, with seating going from the mid hundreds to nearly 400. In comparison, the A380 represents only an incremental increase over the 747."

"Aircraft are about scale and seats," he says. "An airline operating an A380, brand new with fuel efficient engines, lots of seats, and the same crew, has an advantage against somebody flying a 747-400. Everything is a cost game and it's all about efficiency. In upswings the A380 operator will make more money, in a downswing he can sell seats at a lower price and still make money."

The glamour of air travel - for a price

Incremental or not, evolutionary or revolutionary, SIA pulled out all the stops to cast the first commercial service of the A380 on October 25 as the greatest day for aviation since the Wright Brothers' first flight in 1903. SIA's focus was not, unsurprisingly, on the dry meat of slots and operating efficiencies, but on high glamour in the sky - and the world was watching.

When asked about the challenges involved in the launch, the first thing SIA spokesman Stephen Forshaw mentions is the thousands of people interested in being on that historic first flight. "Our challenge was to satisfy all these people and be seen as very fair," he says. "So, we came up with the auction."

The well-publicised auction for seats helped SIA prioritise among the thousands who contacted SIA about being on the first flight, as well as the many who Forshaw says "would have jumped at the opportunity." SIA was also keen that the programme benefit the community. "We didn't want to be seen as profiteering," Huang says.

Three charities to benefit from the profits made on the air tickets were chosen with the aim of appealing to residents in the first cities to enjoy A380 service (Singapore and Sydney) and one that would appeal globally. These were The Community Chest in Singapore, two children's hospitals in Australia, and Médecins Sans Frontières (Doctors Without Borders). "This provided a broad mix of charities that would appeal to people all over the world," Forshaw says. 

To prevent bogus bidders from driving up the price, a qualification process was put in place. To bid a seat on the entire aircraft - first class suites, business class, and economy - required a security deposit of US$10,000 (S$14,478), while bidding on economy and business required a deposit of US$1,000 (S$1,448).  Despite these hefty deposits, the airline received 6,000 bids for the 650 available seats - half on the Singapore-Sydney leg, the other half on the return. Two hundred people put down deposits of US$10,000. 

For SIA's new advertising firm, TBWA, the launch represented the firm's first major project with this key account since TBWA ousted long-term incumbent Batey in April. Dan Paris, managing director of TBWA Singapore, reckons 60% of the firm worked on the A380 launch and auction. According to him, the auction page received 26 million visits from users in 160 countries. It also saw the highest number of new Ebay registrations for any commercial auction on Ebay. 

"This was TBWA's first big campaign for SIA," Huang says. "We told them to drop everything else [for SIA] and focus on this. Creating the concept was the most difficult thing. Once we nailed that, execution was less of a problem. We went through a lot of iterations before coming up with what the world saw." 

With all the seats auctioned off, raising $1.9 million for charity, the launch of the plane itself required tremendous organisation. The launch had several components: SIA's receipt of the jet in Toulouse, France; its arrival in Singapore, where it was met by VIPs including prime minister Lee Hsien Loong; the first flight; and its arrival in Sydney.  To ensure maximum PR exposure globally SIA provided satellite up-links in Toulouse, Singapore, and Sydney, allowing TV crews from around the world to televise live. 

"This was incredibly valuable," Forshaw says. "We even had feedback that networks in Sweden were covering the landing of the first flight in Sydney, and this was possible because we had satellite uplink at every location. This added to the event's exposure and gravitas." He reckons about 300 to 400 journalists were involved in the three key locations, representing the elite of the world's newspapers and TV channels.  

Sixty days notice

Another big challenge was the plane's arrival in Singapore. Scheduled to arrive late in the day on October 17, the SIA team was very concerned about rain. And what if the plane was late? Compounding this was the short time available to plan the plane's arrival: the typical aviation contract requires the manufacturer to give two months notice for the specific delivery date. 

"We needed to give people dates," Huang says. "We were worried about getting everything prepared, but then without the date we'd have no passengers. It was a big relief when Airbus provided a specific date, October 17. Once the date was fixed, we could not have the aircraft arrive quietly."

Fortunately all went well - the plane was on time, and the skies were clear as it taxied to the terminal. Over 1,000 SIA staff, from HR people to mechanics, volunteered to help out on the day of the plane's arrival and on the day of the historic first flight. "We didn't view the launch as a marketing event, but as a company event," Huang says. "We got the entire company involved." Similarly, in full page ads that ran the next day in Singapore media, the tagline read "Singapore welcomes the A380," as opposed to "Singapore Airlines welcomes..."  At the launch event one VIP told Huang that seeing the A380 in SIA livery made him feel like standing up and singing Majulah Singapora.

Despite the amazing PR spectacle of the A380's entry into service, the ads that have accompanied it could be viewed as unadventurous, dealing mainly with the features of SIA's new business and first class - which only a few wealthy travellers will enjoy.   

"We have a new product, so our goal is to tell people about its function," Huang says. "The Singapore Girl hostess [appeals] more [to] the emotional side. We have to know where to run a feel good ad or commercial, and where we need to give a very functional message.  For the first class suite, we focused on the double bed....as for the new business class seat, we designed it ourselves, and we wanted to tell people that there is a distinct difference. That's why the first ad has a guy sitting with a laptop next to him on the seat."

Brand consultant Jorg Dietzel thinks the decision to focus on the features of the first class suite was a wise move. "This created a ‘wow' factor for the new plane that was a good strategic choice. Most people will never experience the suite, but it reflects the rest of the plane and other products. People will think: ‘If first class is that good, the rest must be amazing too.'"

Singapore Girl: Still a great way to fly

As for SIA's future marketing post Batey, Huang is adamant the Singapore Girl will remain, as will the tagline ‘A great way to fly'. "They have served us well: simple to understand and accepted by our customers," he says. "The uniform will also remain because it is unique and easily recognised. The Singapore girl personifies superior in-flight service and an exceptional in-flight experience. We want to present SIA as not an airline that goes from point A to point B, but an airline that gives a fantastic travel experience."

He goes on to compare the distinctive color of the Singapore Girl's kabaya to the constant green hue one finds in Rolex advertisements. Nonetheless, changes can be made: in SIA's more recent ads, the Singapore girl's hair now falls around her shoulders.  "There are things we will tweak, but some things will never change."

What will change is peoples' perceptions of the A380, as SIA adds more to its fleet, and other airlines start flying this remarkable new aircraft - all offering luxurious updates and innovations, no doubt. Those who doubt the A380's prospects should look back at the 747's early days. Years behind schedule owing to serious technical glitches, its first flight, in 1971, was itself delayed three days owing to engine problems, and at the time Boeing owed banks US$18 billion (S$26.06 billion) in 2003 dollars. Over time, however, Boeing sold over 1,400 747s, reaping massive profits. Despite its shaky start, the A380 could be aviation's next game changer - and SIA has positioned itself squarely at the front of the pack. 

[Box Out 1]

Statistics on SIA's A380 charity auction:

 

• 650 seats sold, generating $1.9 million for charity
• 26 million hits on auction page
• Visitors from 160 countries
• Top three countries by visitors: Australia (14.3%), Singapore (10.6%) UK (6.3%)
• Youngest bidder: 22 years old
• Oldest bidder: 86 years old
• Most expensive seat: US$100,380 (S$145,611) for a first class suite
• Cheapest seat: US$560 (S$812.34) for an economy class seat

According to the SIA website, the auction was one of the largest charity auctions, and of the most complex, ever held on Ebay, and the largest Ebay has operated across the Asia Pacific.

Box Out:

The A380 will give SIA a strong marketing edge well into next year, but it won't last forever.  Here's how key rivals stack up.

 

Airline	First delivery	Total confirmed orders for A380	Comments
SIA	October 2007, with five more before August 2008	19
Emirates	August 2008	58	Emirates is set to be the world's largest A380 operator.
Qantas	August 2008	20
British Airways	2012	12
Thai Airways	2010	6
Cathay Pacific	N/A	No orders	Cathay Pacific has no plans to buy the A380.
Malaysia Airlines	Unconfirmed	6