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Jet Blue
NEWS FLASH: The below assessment of JetBlue in our Brand Garage was written before the weather cancellations and bad press crippled the airline a while back. JetBlue responded, however, in a very un-corporate fashion: With self deprecating honesty and truth and refunds. Few other airlines have done this in the face of weather-related problems. Few other industries have done it. In light of a $22 million first quarter loss, CEO and founder, David Neeleman has been tossed as CEO by the board and replaced by president David Barger. Mr. Barger may be a wonderful man and an incredible CEO, but the following quote in the news article announcing the ousting of Neeleman puts in blunt terms what is wrong in business everywhere, not just at Jet Blue. "Barger is a real operations guy," said Ray Neidl, a Calyon Securities USA, Inc. analyst in New York. "The airline has reached a certain size where visionaries are being pushed aside and the hard-core operations guys are taking over." Mr. Neidl's observation is a cogent observation indeed. It is a tragic fallacy of business thinking that makes operations people and visionary leaders two separate functions. But it happens. Look at Apple. When they named Scully as the leader and ousted Jobs, what happened to Apple? When they brought Jobs back, what happened to Apple? We'll let you do the research on that one because that's a whole other Brand Garage the size of a 747 hanger. There are a million examples of this "organization over inspiration" mentality. We're not saying operations people are bad, we're saying they'd better be visionaries too because operations never saved a company. That's what visionaries do. And JetBlue was created out of vision. It's why there is a JetBlue. There is no shortage of operations-focused airlines (some in or near bankruptcy). Vision is what set JetBlue apart. When the visionaries are no longer needed in a company whose sole reason for being is based on the very unairline-ish vision of "Above all else, JetBlue Airways is dedicated to bringing humanity back to air travel", you have to wonder what Operations people and visionaries are not mutually exclusive. They must be the same people.
JetBlue is the hyper-successful airline that somehow manages to buck the headwinds against which the other carriers struggle (minus the gurus at Southwest). JetBlue has figured this thing out at just about every level. Let’s take a little trip.
TT: I have nothing bad to say about JetBlue. If given a choice, I will choose them every time. They are an example of what you can do when you really want to do it. They created a fun, simple experience in the middle of an industry overbooked with pain. They deliver on their simple promise: “To continue to bring humanity back to air travel.” GS: You’re sucking up pretty hard there, man. Bucking for some free tickets? TT: I wish, amen, and pass the boarding pass. MP: You like JetBlue better than Pop-Tarts? AB: Now you’re pushing him to the edge. He’ll freak. TT: Don’t dis the 'Tarts, people. They keep me alive. Meanwhile, back on the tarmac. Start with their low prices and easy reservations; simple, fast, painless. JetBlue’s website is uncluttered, focused and stressless, just like their flights. The site features video stories from passengers and JetBlue people about the great service or something they loved. You can easily share compliments or concerns (try that on many corporate sites and you’ll be digging in the hardware looking for the gatekeeper’s e-mail address for a while). JC: They have maximized their freshness and minimized our pain. TT: Exactly. It’s like an iPod or iPhone – ergonomically comfortable. Jet Blue is 3,000 miles down the flight path to owning the book on branding a genuinely pleasant flight experience. AM: Not a bad thing to own considering the current flying situation. FM: It’s easy to get tickets, easy to get on and off. You have all-leather seats and each one is served with DirecTV and XM Satellite Radio, free wireless, Fox in-flight movies and – imagine this – legroom. Yeah, I know that’s hard to do in a commercial airliner these days, but just try. Or just fly JetBlue and you won’t have to imagine it. MP: This is interesting because I am like a focus group. I’ve seen their ads and have been to their site. They definitely look different. I’ve never flown them, however. But I did check out their low prices. I was going to have my husband take me to Bermuda for my birthday. I hate flying and am thinking that JetBlue sounds like a better option. I am sick of dirty, germ-infested planes. TT: Ditto. We flew to Maui last summer on a regular airline (I won’t mention who), and the flight was exactly what you just described – so miserable it nearly erased the experience of the most amazing island in the world. Traveling can be terrible – or not. JetBlue has chosen “not”. Me too. FM: Funny thing happened the other day at the Moore household. We found out my nephew is getting married this summer in Colorado. Honest to goodness – my 13- year-old says, “If we’re flying JetBlue, I’m in!” First of all – I’m taken aback by the fact that we officially have a teenager in the house in that she now "tells" her parents when she is “in” and when she is “out”. But the second realization is that my daughter – always seeking out what is “coolest” – is asking for a specific airline by name. What’s up with that? AB: She’s right on. I just got back from Colorado two days ago and I chose another airline. HUGE mistake. I felt like a caged cockroach. TT: See, branding works. Especially when the brand delivers the experience and the experience delivers the brand. That’s a perfect example. So many companies separate Operations and Branding and that’s a mistake. Customers don’t separate it. It’s all the same to them. GS: The logo and the website and the ads and the look and feel and color and the experience are one thing to consumers. TT: Not sold separately. FM: Talk about an organization that "gets" credible marketing today – JetBlue understands that ALL of their connection points (not just TV ads or other PR efforts) are a great opportunities to brand. The know that the more unusual the "communication piece," the better. One JetBlue "marketing piece" impacted me the most on one of their flights over a year ago and I still remember it to this day. (damatic pause) FM: It was a napkin. (more dramatic pause) GS: Did you say a napkin? FM: I did. And that’s the point. I got on the JetBlue plane, they gave me my Diet Coke and a napkin. Upon sipping my DC, I happened to peruse my napkin and it had something written on it: “Hey, don’t tell the guy next to you – but we like you better.” Now I am doing a little chuckle. I didn’t expect to be marketed to at this point – but JetBlue has started my experience on their aircraft with a little humor – awesome. TT: That was me sitting next to you. FM: You were wearing a dress? AB: That was Dee. FM: Anyway, I remember thinking – on the other airlines, they would have "used" the napkin to try to sell something (like a magazine subscription or new self-help book) or just print their logo. Not JetBlue –they opportunistically utilized this space to reinforce their brand experience. Kudos to the Blue. TT: My 20-year-old son is the same way as Fred’s daughter. He flew JetBlue once and he thinks they should be running every company in America, and maybe the government. He talked about his experience endlessly when he came home. DB: I’ve talked endlessly about some flights I’ve been on as well before, but not in a good way. TT: You and I have been on our share of those. JetBlue delivers on more than they promise and they brand such simplicity in a cool, fresh way that seems effortless. And effortless is not a word I associate with flying very much. AB: Differentiate. FM: Change the paradigm. JC: At least vacuum the carpet and don’t leave old peanut wrappers in the magazine pocket. TT: They zig when others zag. In an airport full of misery, they are a smile. The have a flight plan that avoids the hassles I associate with flying. Plus, you ever see anyone wearing Delta paraphernalia who didn’t work for Delta? USAir and American – same thing. Not knocking them, just stating the obvious. Over at the sky blue website, people are buying and wearing JetBlue merchandise like T-shirts and sweatshirts and hoodies. Get this, they sell even JetBlue body butter and JetBlue lip balm and JetBlue baby bibs and JetBlue cruises. Easy meets engaging and cross-pollinates with fun and fresh and all the other things every client talks about but somehow manages to over-organize out of the experience. These people are running a 500 mph seminar on Branding at 30,000 feet. They’re not selling you a ticket, they’re creating a relationship. GS: That’s pure brand mojo, baby! Indeed, when most airlines sell me a ticket, I feel like I’m being taken for a ride – a turbulent, no-frills one, at that. JetBlue might be selling tickets, but you a happen to be getting a great experience in the deal. And it's the experience that counts and, in the case of a cynical traveler, often turns to a true-blue love affair. After all, no matter how “good” (big or well known) a brand is, it can’t sell a relationship if the experience itself doesn’t match the price of admission. And in today’s overpriced, under-leg-roomed, “stuff ‘em like sardines and shuffle ‘em like cattle” airways, the experience of most travelers is more crash-and-burn than soaring praise. AB: And consequently, when you have a bad experience you share it. TT: That’s a great point. Buick did some research once that was focused on the good/bad experience with customers. If you had a good experience with a car dealer, you’d tell one person – maybe. If you had a bad experience, however, you’d tell almost everyone you know. GS: True. Like you said, it’s the WHOLE brand enchilada. Right from the gate, JetBlue didn’t just set out to write a new chapter in the book on air travel, they tore out all the pages and created a brand-new (and brand defining) flight plan. And what defines their brand isn’t just their incredibly simple and user-friendly website, or helpful employees, or clever merchandising, or clearly human, jovial spirit (and it certainly isn’t their blue tails or corporate logo)… it’s an undeniable and unified passion for doing what they love to do. They found a way to bring humanity and fun back to air travel. And this passion seeps from every pore in their brand’s skin, and they are comfortable in that skin. They know who they are, and so do we. That is why there are no passengers on a JetBlue flight, only people. It’s a plane filled with relationships. AB: Men…talking about relationships. I’m getting all teary eyed. Am I watching "The View" here? MP: Which of you guys is Rosie? GS: Speaking of Rosie, their numbers are a good example of a brand delivering ROI. TT: Nice segue, dude. GS: Thank you. It’s true that first impressions are lasting ones and, with JetBlue, most people’s first experience comes LONG before booking their first flight. JetBlue is a company of incredible stories, collected and shared; they have crafted an incredible Brand Mythology all their own. For most airlines, the bottom-line focus seems like treating people like baggage. At JetBlue, it’s the starting line of opportunity. Treat people like people, and your bottom line will take care of itself. I mean, consider this: JetBlue is offering a free beer or cocktail to all travelers flying on Super Bowl Sunday! And you can bet the pilots will be offering play-by-play color commentary from the cockpit. Most airlines would focus on how much money this will cost them. JetBlue might "lose" a few dollars, but will inherit a wealth of brand goodwill! TT: And that fills planes. This all sounds familiar doesn’t it? It sounds like what Saturn once was before the corporate noodlers turned it into just another GM brand. They had the devoted aficionados in the ads just like JetBlue, and those people told their real stories about their experience (relationship) with the brand. It’s like what The Gap once was and like what Target is now. It’s the experience of Washington Mutual versus any regular bank. It’s the Apple and the PC guys on TV. One has a cool, friendly personality you aspire to. The other, while not a bad guy, is what you expect from the computer geek. These are branding beacons in the boring darkness of me-toodom.
JC: That is deep, Mr. Hemingway. GS: It’s no wonder that JetBlue was one of the only airlines not to post a loss following September 11th. Even in the midst of adversity, they were a beacon and still are. While other airlines go Chapter 11, whining and whimpering for bailouts and going on the chopping block, JetBlue has been one to remain faithful to the people it serves. They are truly a brand built on human relationships. Others can learn from their example, don’t you think? We know every industry has (or desperately needs) their own version of JetBlue – their own beacons. This is an opportunity for other brands to rise up and become the torchbearer of not “what is,” but “what can be.” Who will be next JetBlue or Apple or Google or, yes, even Hyundai (watch out Toyota)? TT: Good question. It takes vision from the top. People have to be willing to do things differently, take chances, talk differently and act differently. They have to be willing to do more than just advertise differently, they have to deliver differently. We all know the companies who are doing this. AB: I have the receipts to prove it. TT: I recently read a book about Pete Rozelle, the legendary commissioner of the NFL who – through sheer audacity, guts and ability to see farther, push farther and go farther – made a minor-league ugly stepsister (of then-dominant college football) into the biggest business in sports. He created the Super Bowl, a national holiday now, and, by doing so, created countless other things we take for granted as basic American Culture 101. He saw TV as the vehicle when baseball and boxing still ruled radio. He took blue collar guys making $30,000 a year (and they were the superstars) and turned them into rich giants. Every day, he did what Apple asks us to do: Think different. Example: When it started, the Super Bowl was just another game to pretty much everyone who saw it and especially to those who played in it. Rozelle put in motion a plan that was ready when Joe Willie Namath dropped his outrageous “guarantee” of a Jets win against the favored Colts in 1969 and delivered it as promised. Suddenly, the Super Bowl was a cultural icon, a part of the American popular cultural fabric like Huck Finn, and the NFL was a sellable brand and the rest is history. In the beginning, 40-50 million people watched the Super Bowl on TV and a 30-second commercial cost $42,000. This year, 1 billion people saw the game and that :30 cost $2.3 million. Do the math: Being a visionary is good business.
Big R's Brand Garage will be happy to discuss your brand. Just send us your product or e-mail Terry Taylor or Geoff Stone. Click here to return to the main brand garage page.
Opinions expressed here and in any corresponding comments are the personal opinions of the original authors, not necessarily of Big River and may not have been reviewed in advance by Big River.
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Watch out over there; those big engines are still a little warm. We’ve wedged a big, blue, polka-dotted jet in the Brand Garage this morning and we’re going to inspect what goes on in and around it.