What’s old is new again......

United’s new Eurowhite livery is a return to the boring livery that brought us the Braniff colors back in the day.

In support of eurowhite: white paint weighs less and is more reflective, which requires less energy to carry and cool.

Negatives: the name eurowhite is not inclusive and may trigger feelings of micro aggression.

https://thedesignair.net/2017/02/11/...critical-mass/

https://thedesignair.net/2013/11/04/...hite-aircraft/

Against a white backdrop you can dress the employees as any cartoon character you want and they’ll appear to fit.

 

I could see your point if the rebranding was a fresh start. A true departure of what we have today. But it isn’t. It is an iteration or derivative of what the current livery is today. The globe remains (I’m post merger, not into the tulip vs. globe fight), the stencil looking font remains, and the belly has gone from a straight border to a parabolic one.

Want to spend millions one a innovative repackage, fine. Want to spend millions on this? How about we spend it on better WiFi, sat com on the fleet, chillers, a bulkhead between first and coach on the max, reinstating the FA deduced from the widebody.......
you get the point. All in the middle of section six negotiations. What a coincidence.

 

“Iconic” - Yes
“Historic” - maybe from the reference of the younger pilots. But for us more long in the tooth guys...seriously? It was incorporated in 1973...way way after the founding of the airline. That’s like saying the Air Force is “historic”. Not buying it.

 

Well, the engines went from Gray to blue.....and way back when Steven Wolfe took over UAL from Dick Ferris, he promised that United would grow.

He painted larger "United" on the sides of the planes. Deja vu.

 

I think rebranding is majorly needed, however I don’t think they moved away from current design in doing so. But I am no PR designer .

More importantly front line employees need to get better in order to rebrand otherwise we will get the same old bad PR we’ve gotten for years . Not sure but have actually heard good things about the FA training that they all had to do in ORD, Not sure if that will turn an old crusty 55 year FA into a good service employee but it is what needed . Gate agents as we’ll. I use United and Jetblue to commute sometimes Delta , and they simply blow us away on a service stand point .

Paint on the plane won’t fix rude over worked gate agent.

 

From one hour those “expert” articles:

“That is why especially for legacy carriers, where it is harder to trim costs due to staff pensions, infrastructure or cabin offerings, we are seeing more of a radical change in liveries. ”

So the writer must be an expert on paint and design, because he or she is obviously about two decades off on this.

The legacies” are the new LCCs.

Back in the day UAL’s 737s were all coach with 98 seats. SWA in the same model had 118 I believe.

 

WHY did they decide to put the name UNITED in Big, Bold letters, on top of the windows?
How's it going to look when some of the window shades are open, some are closed.. during the daytime, and especially at night?

Weird..

Also, did they put United or UAL on the belly? That in itself would be smart marketing.. have seen Foreign carriers with it but recently I also believe I say a Delta Jet with it, or maybe it was just the widget.

In the end, (in my opinion).. this was (again) a whole lot of fluff and not much substance.

Oh well.. guess there's gonna be less money available for next years PS?!
And what about Contract 2020?!

FS, FP & FtC
Motch

 

I don't get "the new paint job is going to cost us our beloved profit sharing or contract" mantra. The planes have to be painted anyway.

So instead of Frankie Smoothtalk's golden parachute it's now the Blue Puerto Rican Hair Net. In keeping with a Caribbean pastel color motif of course.

 

Conspicuous outrage coupled with virtue signaling in 5....4....3....

 

Yes the planes have to be painted anyway. But....we are in contract talks. For those of you who haven't been through one, every excuse under the sun will be used to justify not paying pay raises. "We're rebranding the airline. That costs money." Money they say will not be available for the contract.

Do not believe for one minute that there is only X amount of money. And all the expenses, including the contract, have to come out of the bucket.

We are paid what we are worth, which comes down to how we negotiate, not if the planes are painted or not. Hence the thinly veiled sarcasm in the above post.

So, this is one reason I believe profit sharing is a red herring. That does come out of profits. If you buy a whole fleet of new ground equipment, no money left in profit sharing. One way to spin the numbers to reduce the payouts. Yes, they cook the books. Lots of ways to do it. I know many are up against retirement savings limits, and taxes, but pay rates are in black and white, profit sharing is not. I'm for better pay rates, and forget about profit sharing.