Airline Livery and Airline Branding: Part 2

In the second installment of our “Airline Livery and Airline Branding” investigative series, we look at some companies that haven’t quite merged the concepts of corporate identities and airline liveries. These liveries are not as atrocious as those featured in Part 1 of our series, but they still have a long way to go.

Lufthansa livery
Europe’s second largest airline has a livery strikingly similar to Continental (which will appear later in our list), but our assessment of Lufthansa is far worse.

The plane is white with a grey underbelly and a blue tail with a circular orange bird design. But as the flag carrier for Germany, we expect a little more. The only thing to suggest German pride is the name (Lufthansa - meaning, roughly, “air traders”) but that is simply not enough of an identifying mark; the planes could just as easily be Swiss or Austrian, to name a few options.

Are we holding national airlines to higher standards? Of course, especially in this case. Whilst we’ll openly criticise planes who stick to traditional blue and white liveries, or red-white-blue color schemes, at least in some of these cases they are representing their flag (e.g. Air France and American Airlines). Lufthansa really has no excuse for integrating little more than an orange bird on its tail (the Goethe-Institut calls it “one of the most beautiful German logos of all time” - we think not). This is one of the few times where black would go a long way towards making an airline look better.

This is what you get when a logo is nearly as old as the German empire. This livery could have come from any time period in the 20th century - and looks like it has, with generous appointments of steel grey and washed-out navy - and the planes have no national identity whatsoever.

Lufthansa branding grade: D

Northwest Airlines livery
Northwest Airlines, sorry, “NWA” has changed their livery a lot over the years, from the famed (and much loved) “bowling shoe” design to the current white w/red incarnation. What they’re using now - a grey-white body with simple “nwa - Northwest Airlines” and a red tail with an abstract compass - is really nothing special.

Much is made of that faux compass, actually, which is genius in concept but didn’t quite translate to the airliners’ livery. Look at the left side of the plane and the image is doing what it was designed to do: subtly pointing to the northwest. It’s a simple, but nice, image that also features in the NWA logo. However, step to the other side of the aircraft and you’ll wonder if you’re flying on NEA now; the compass points to the northeast.

How could such a design flaw (and it is a flaw, as much as some may beg to differ) go unnoticed? It could have been such a push for NWA’s brand identity - a shape with a message (unlike Delta). But it went to the painters the way it is, and so we’re left with these dingy not-quite-white planes with an ill-conceived logo.

Northwest Airlines branding grade: D

South African Airways livery
South African Airways, the flag carrier of Africa’s largest economic country, has had to undergo livery changes in response to government changes. In 1994, following the end of apartheid, South Africa’s official flag changed significantly, and South African Airways’ livery followed suit soon thereafter.

The new livery is simple, but pleasant, and contains several nice artistic touches. The tail contains the South African flag with a sun at the peak, a fitting way to symbolize the country whilst representing the flag. The flag and colors are also picked up on the wingtips.

It’s a bold tail design that unfortunately does not extend to the rest of the aircraft. The body section of the planes are Eurowhite, with “South African” in thin blue letters along the side. The font is a great choice and does pick up on the style of the airline a bit more, but more could have been done to capitalise on the bold color scheme of the national flag. It’s so dynamic, so promising, and then… nothing.

As it is, the livery look very plain - except for the tail section - and the corporate brand is not well-defined by a particular logo. We’ve little doubt that if South Africa were to change its national flag again, the airline would have no trouble changing their branding right along with it.

South African Airways branding grade: D+

Air France livery
The livery of Air France hasn’t changed since the 1970s, despite a recent merger with Dutch carrier KLM. The plane’s branding is, in a word, outdated. The tail section, with its sweeping blue and red lines, is generic at best and does nothing to evoke the culture or heritage of France, save the color scheme (and our guess is that this was an accident, more to do with the all-too-common red-white-blue scheme than France’s flag. The colors would be organised differently if this weren’t true).

The commoner’s tail and the too-fat lettering on the body of the jet give Air France a failingly average mark for branding. Shouldn’t planes look sleek and aerodynamic? You almost expect these aircraft to plop onto the runway rather than roll gracefully.

Air France branding grade: D+

Follow the other installments of our “Airline Livery and Airline Branding” investigative series: