A Virgin rebirth

Shortly after, the two aircraft were towed to a media event held on Sydney Airport’s GA apron, with Borghetti and Virgin Group founder Sir Richard Branson proudly waving Australia flags from the flightdeck windows of the A330 as it was towed to its parking position.

The Virgin Australia name will also be applied to the airline’s international Pacific Blue and V Australia operations.

The livery was designed by Hans Hulsbosch, who worked closely with Borghetti when the Virgin Australia boss was the number 2 at Qantas on that airline’s 2008 brand refresh. The new livery features a white background with the trademark ‘Virgin’ logo in red across the tail and rear fuselage, while there are red bands around the engine cowlings, a redesigned new ‘flying lady’ on the nose, and silver, lower case ‘virgin australia’ titles in silver on the forward fuselage, using the same font style as recently adopted by Virgin Atlantic.

From the May 4 relaunch Virgin Blue began operating domestically in Australia as Virgin Australia, while Borghetti also confirmed that the Pacific Blue and V Australia international arms of the airline will be rebranded as Virgin Australia by the end of 2011 as well. This was perhaps the media launch day’s biggest surprise, with the airline able to successfully negotiate a deal with Singapore Airlines which allows it to use the Virgin Australia for its international V Australia and Pacific Blue brands as well, given the airline a brand cohesiveness previously not available to it.

Borghetti wouldn’t reveal details of the agreement with Singapore Airlines, but it reportedly involves paying royalties to Singapore Airline to use the Virgin brand internationally.

As well as the new name, branding and livery, Virgin Australia also showed off its new domestic business class, with both the A330 and 737-800 fitted with business class seating, while a new ‘premium’ product offering is in the pipeline for Pacific Blue as well, with product enhancements for V Australia also planned. Both business and economy class feature grey leather seats (with economy class seats featuring red, purple and light grey headrests, while the 737 also featured the new ‘Boeing Sky’ 787 inspired interior, with its resculpted sidewalls and larger overhead bins.

The A330, the second of two the airline was due to place into service on the Sydney-Perth ‘Coast-to-Coast’ route from May 26, features a 27 seat business class, with one row (row 1) set at six abreast, and three rows at seven abreast, with 251 economy class seats. The 737’s cabin feature eight business class sets four abreast in two rows, with xxx economy class seats (compared to 180 seats in Virgin Blue 737-800s to date).
While the 737 entered service later on May 4 flying to Ballina, Virgin Australia won’t begin selling domestic 737 business class seats until later in the year when more so equipped 737s are in service.

Borghetti told media that the rebranding exercise would cost in the order of $30-35 million (which, interestingly, he noted was about the cost of one new 737, whereas as the Boeing list price is over US$80m), in part because the airline is taking delivery of XX new aircraft through the remainder of the year, all of which will feature the new livery. Consequently some 20 aircraft will feature the Virgin Australia livery by the end of the year. But airport signage was due to be changed over within days of the May 4 launch.

A television advertising campaign developed by Clemenger BBDO and custom written music by Les Gock Sound Thinking launching the new branding aired on national television on the evening of May 4.

The rebranding and renaming, and the public debut of the new business class product, has capped off a busy first year at the helm of Virgin Blue/Virgin Australia for John Borghetti, with his ‘Game Change Program’ well advanced. They come on top of a raft of other changes already revealed, from alliances with Air New Zealand, Etihad and (still subject to US DoT approval) Delta, restructuring V Australia’s route network with flights to Abu Dhabi to link up with Etihad, acquisition of the Airbus A330s, a new regional operation in partnership with Skywest which will fly up to 18 ATR 72 turboprops, new uniforms, a valet parking and premium entry service at Sydney Airport, new food and drink menus. But still more is to come, with Borghetti promising a relaunch of its frequent flyer program later in the year, and with more, as yet undisclosed changes, hinted.

So May 4 definitely turned the page for an airline launched a decade ago as the cheap and cheerful anti-establishment David taking on the Qantas and Ansett’s Goliath. The airline that is now known as Virgin Australia is a low cost carrier no more, having all the trappings of a traditional full service airline – business class, lounges, a frequent flyer program, a mixed fleet of wide and narrow body jets, and soon, regional turboprops, and codesharing alliances with other full service airlines.

In truth this transformation was already well underway under former Virgin Blue CEO Brett Godfrey, as he aimed to reshape VB as a ‘new world carrier’. But Borghetti has taken this further, with a very classy rebranding and a sassy TV advertising campaign more reminiscent of something Virgin Atlantic would produce.

It is an upmarket branding more in line with Virgin Atlantic and Virgin America, and one that gives key competitor Qantas pause for thought.