jfklganyc wrote:

Where is the airline name?

Have to put something on there.

AS is now a Boeing/Airbus airline...surely that reality has set in, no?

Feel for the ATC folks who have to figure out what airline that is from a distance

ADrum23 wrote:

rj777 wrote:

Is it just me or is there no AS logo on it anywhere?

I don't see it either.

I presume the text under the first couple of windows identifies the certificate holder who operates the airplane. That’s required by FAR.

Actually, looking more closely, even the horrid SF Giants livery will look just fine with the Chester, and the blues and greens sweeping in from the tail. The swoops of the bridge, and the orange will look rather ... acceptable.

NWADTWE16 wrote:

THis merger has been so painful to watch. VX represented everything great about flying, it was the airline to counter "blah airlines". To see it absorbed by the "blahest" of airlines turns my stomach.

To be honest, the incompentence of the AS mgmt. in allowing things like this to occur, have me wondering if this airline has anything working properly at the moment, ie safety, there I said it, but as a passenger, I don't feel comfortable spending a dime on this carrier. They boxed themselves into this corner, and their behavior is earily similar to another company which also boxed themselves into a corner recently, their best pal Boeing.

Long live VX, but not this merged fiasco!

A little dramatic?
I would be more worried that an airline that has never made money is not very safe.
Alaska is a well run and safe airline - they have come a long way.
Get a grip.

Jeez. Would it kill them to at least put something on the tail? A building, maybe?

CobaltScar wrote:

Anything that gets that ugly lord of the rings dwarf-looking thing with the creepy smile off the tail is a improvement.

Why don't they try putting Sweet Chastity for a change? Can anyone draw a graphic design? Make it look a little decadent, if you know what I mean.

The worst promotional livery I've ever seen.

Can't Alaska have their logo on the best jets if they aren't Boeing.

Maybe they better sell them to AA, Delta, Jetblue, Hawaiian or Spirit then.

PlanesNTrains wrote:

SFOtoORD wrote:

So ugly. Alaska has been doing better on brand identity, but this is a net negative to those efforts.

It's a couple of planes caught in merger purgatory. Who cares?

That’s not how a good brand team works. Putting out mediocre design is a setback to what they are doing. Just do another VX plane or another Giants plane vs some schlock.

Dammit I just want to see a normal Alaska Airlines livery on their Airbuses!!!

Even if these are temporary liveries, it is it is a major marketing and branding mess if you want to continue to call yourself Alaska but want to position yourself as the West Coast airline. It is like Hawaiian trying to position itself as the West Coast airline.

KiloRomeoDelta wrote:

If they don't want to scrub off the PROUDLY ALL BOEING writing from under the cockpit of their entire existing fleet, I have a suggestion to edit it-

PROUDLY ALL BOEING AND AIRBUS ...AND EMBRAER AND BOMBARDIER

or better yet.. PROUDLY IN DENIAL

I don’t know. The AS management team didn’t exactly inspire confidence during the Q3 earnings call. I fear this merger could end the way of how Air Cal and PSA integrations eventually ended: Destroyed shareholder value; grounded fleets; and dismantled route structures.

This livery is horrible. I normally like liveries with lots of color but holy crap, it looks like Shrek threw up on the airplane. As a loyal Redwood flyer who won’t be switching to Alaska after the merger, it kills me to see it progress, but leaving the tail blank like that? C’mon! As much as it pains me to say it, I’d rather see that eskimo on the tail instead of a blank space. It looks incomplete!

NWADTWE16 wrote:

THis merger has been so painful to watch. VX represented everything great about flying, it was the airline to counter "blah airlines". To see it absorbed by the "blahest" of airlines turns my stomach.

To be honest, the incompentence of the AS mgmt. in allowing things like this to occur, have me wondering if this airline has anything working properly at the moment, ie safety, there I said it, but as a passenger, I don't feel comfortable spending a dime on this carrier. They boxed themselves into this corner, and their behavior is earily similar to another company which also boxed themselves into a corner recently, their best pal Boeing.

Long live VX, but not this merged fiasco!

You had me 100% until you mentioned safety. Let’s be real here, this is Alaska Airlines we’re talking about here, not Cubana. I completely agree that Alaska is making a massive mistake ditching the vibrant Virgin branding for their much less appealing, more boring “blah” brand, but their incompetency to properly brand an aircraft has zero to do with safety. You’re comparing apples to oranges.

The engines use the same colors but a different pattern from the standard Alaska livery. So strange.

I new knew you could make an A321 look bad, but... first time for everything?

DLASFlyer wrote:

The engines use the same colors but a different pattern from the standard Alaska livery. So strange.

Not really. They will match the colors on the tail after it's an Alaska jet.

Tailwinds wrote:

The plane CAN'T yet have Alaska branding because it's a Virgin jet flying Virgin flights. If it were operating Alaska flights they could at least say Alaska Airlines operated by Virgin America, but that changeover hasn't happened yet. Expect this to go back in the paint shop for a Chester and Alaska branding ASAP once they have a single operating certificate. Same with the SF Giants plane.

Edit: These two liveries are decals. Effectively they're white-tails. Instead of taking new deliveries with the Virgin livery and repainting them later, they're taking new deliveries as all-white and using decals to spruce them up a little until they get the OK to take the full Alaska livery. Who knows if they'll stick around as special livery planes after that.

THIS POST HERE!

Now can we all breathe for a second? There is a sticker (just like in any other merger or acquisition of an airline) that says “Operated By Virgin America” by the door. When AS and VX have a single operating certificate, the decals will either be removed and the plane will be painted in full AS house livery or at least additional AS titles will be added. In the meantime they’re thinking on their feet and finding ways to keep new VX planes from being pure white or having to be repainted. This isn’t Boeing loyalists or some rebrand. It’s a one off quick fix until they can put their house livery on their plane.

Also, I’m not mad at how it looks, though it is incomplete. With a Chester tail and AS name on the forward fuselage it will even out.

"Just do another VX Plane"

Do you know how much it costs to paint a plane? Its NOT cheap..

While these A321s aren't the prettiest looking birds flying around right now, its just a quick fix. Very likely within a year both of these birds will be repainted in the standard AS colors. Stickers never stopped someone from boarding a plane and getting to where they have to go.

"THis merger has been so painful to watch. VX represented everything great about flying, it was the airline to counter "blah airlines". To see it absorbed by the "blahest" of airlines turns my stomach.

To be honest, the incompentence of the AS mgmt. in allowing things like this to occur, have me wondering if this airline has anything working properly at the moment, ie safety, there I said it, but as a passenger, I don't feel comfortable spending a dime on this carrier."

Ugly stickers on a plane = unsafe? Always read something new everyday on this site....

You had me 100% until you mentioned safety. Let’s be real here, this is Alaska Airlines we’re talking about here, not Cubana. I completely agree that Alaska is making a massive mistake ditching the vibrant Virgin branding for their much less appealing, more boring “blah” brand, but their incompetency to properly brand an aircraft has zero to do with safety. You’re comparing apples to oranges.[/quote]

and that's fine my friend. I flew nearly 40000 miles this year and I am telling you how I feel, which I am 100% entitled to. You may think its silly, but this carrier bit off way more than they can chew, they cant handle it. They are cocky, and elitest and likely cutting corners to absorb the horrible financial purchase they made. Are they cutting corners on safety? who knows, likely not, but everything they have done thus far has me steering very clear of Alaska.

For the record , my other favorite B6 needs to get off wall street **** and start investing in "CUSTOMER SERVICE" and upgrading old interiors or they will lose my business as well. I am just one flyer, but if I am thinking these things, likely others are as well.

To say the Alaksa livery fits the A321 is an understatement...

I like it. Alaska is thinking outside the box, and that is good. After all, they just merged with an airline that was known for thinking outside the box.

f18raider wrote:

To say the Alaksa livery fits the A321 is an understatement...

That's hot.

NWADTWE16 wrote:

THis merger has been so painful to watch. VX represented everything great about flying, it was the airline to counter "blah airlines". To see it absorbed by the "blahest" of airlines turns my stomach.

To be honest, the incompentence of the AS mgmt. in allowing things like this to occur, have me wondering if this airline has anything working properly at the moment, ie safety, there I said it, but as a passenger, I don't feel comfortable spending a dime on this carrier. They boxed themselves into this corner, and their behavior is earily similar to another company which also boxed themselves into a corner recently, their best pal Boeing.

Long live VX, but not this merged fiasco!

What an ignorant, inflammatory post to suggest that safety is less a priority because AS bought VX. Ridiculous and insulting to the good men and women at both carriers. VX is nice - as a passenger there are certain things I like about it and certain things I don’t; AS is nice - as a passenger there are certain things I like about it and certain things I don’t. At the end of the day will I cry when the last VX flight lands will I cry? Not necessarily. AS is a good, stable carrier with generally happy employees and the best customer service philosophy in the US - and I say this as a DL platinum.

Wow! Lots of anti-Alaska entiment here. One post stated the Alaska being the blahest of all airlines...sounds pretty ignorant to me...just how many airlines have you flown on? I can name many other airlines that a lot more "blah" than Alaska. Did Alaska management make a mistake? Only the future will tell. The airline industry was far different back in the Air Cal and PSA days than now. The absorption of VX was more of strategic move to keep B6 and NK from creating an west coast empire. VX may have been a new, fresh idea for airline service, but it didn't make profits of leaps and bounds. I believe that in a major economic downturn, VX would have been history! I love how some of you armchair CEO's have opinions with NOTHING to back it up.

Great plane, horrible livery. Shame on you AS.

Alaska--Can we please get one with the golden nugget paint scheme?

f18raider wrote:

To say the Alaksa livery fits the A321 is an understatement...

I thought I'd see you here.

Chuska wrote:

Alaska--Can we please get one with the golden nugget paint scheme?

Ah, have that one done too.

f18raider wrote:

To say the Alaksa livery fits the A321 is an understatement...

Honestly it feels like whoever made their new livery knew that in the near future AS would be getting A321s because it honestly looks better on the Airbus then any other plane in Alaska's fleet.

Not sure what the fuss is about. The plane is currently in MIA and has been for over 2 weeks. I think SOC I has been rumored to happen around Jan 11 if I remember. They are probably keeping it in MIA till they know the soc is coming and then it will be sent to Victorville for a quick Chesterizing of the tail.

SXDFC wrote:

"Just do another VX Plane"

Do you know how much it costs to paint a plane? Its NOT cheap..

An airline is part transportation company, part marketing company. They just shouldn’t put out this kind of poor brand example. It’s not the end of the world, but someone needs to be sweating the details on the marketing side of this merger and this looks very lax.

I still don't understand what SOC has to do with painting the plane. SkyWest and Horizon have Alaska livery on their planes, yet have different operating certificates.

f18raider wrote:

Chuska wrote:

Alaska--Can we please get one with the golden nugget paint scheme?

Ah, have that one done too.

The gold stripe just in front of the engine could be a little thinner but that looks really nice, too

Could VX at least put a Virgin decal on the tail to fill up some of the white space?

NWADTWE16 wrote:

THis merger has been so painful to watch. VX represented everything great about flying, it was the airline to counter "blah airlines". To see it absorbed by the "blahest" of airlines turns my stomach.

To be honest, the incompentence of the AS mgmt. in allowing things like this to occur, have me wondering if this airline has anything working properly at the moment, ie safety, there I said it, but as a passenger, I don't feel comfortable spending a dime on this carrier. They boxed themselves into this corner, and their behavior is earily similar to another company which also boxed themselves into a corner recently, their best pal Boeing.

Long live VX, but not this merged fiasco!

Unless you're sitting on private information, not only is this statement ludicrous and unfounded, but it is entirely subjective. One could use the same rationale for any carrier whose livery or product he or she doesn't like. I'm not the biggest fan of Spirit's yellow livery or Air New Zealand's decision to ditch their teal for black, for example, but both are perfectly safe airlines unless regulators publish credible reports tomorrow detailing safety violations.

Brand strategy/product development teams and operations are entirely separate departments with minimal overlap.

Would you board a plane that has a mismatched radome?

f18raider wrote:

To say the Alaksa livery fits the A321 is an understatement...

That looks a lot better than I thought it would, but its missing "Proudly all Boeing" on the nose.

In all seriousness, I'm amazed that even AS is operating Airbus now.

So US airlines operating the A320 are:

DL
AA

UA

B6
AS
F9

NK
G4

HA

US airlines not operating the A320 are:

WN

IPFreely wrote:

NWADTWE16 wrote:

Long live VX, but not this merged fiasco!

VX is dead. Any business that loses $523,000,000 over 10 years is going to die. An acquisition was the only hope for the shareholders to ever get their money back and for the the employees to keep their jobs.

I don't think John Borghetti got your memo.

f18raider wrote:

To say the Alaksa livery fits the A321 is an understatement...

Very nice fit of the AS livery on the 321! It really is a perfect look.

I like it as much as I love HA's livery on this beautiful bird!

Nice job, f18'. Thanks for that.

bb

f18raider wrote:

To say the Alaksa livery fits the A321 is an understatement...

That actually is kind of hot! The great thing about AS's livery, which was so perfectly executed, is how modern it is without overdoing it.

Naturally, while I think it will look far better on the MAX, the A321neo wears it well!

AaronPGH wrote:

This is really really bad

Looks like something a 3rd world African airline would come up on a 30 year old aircraft.

Tailwinds wrote:

The plane CAN'T yet have Alaska branding because it's a Virgin jet flying Virgin flights. If it were operating Alaska flights they could at least say Alaska Airlines operated by Virgin America, but that changeover hasn't happened yet. Expect this to go back in the paint shop for a Chester and Alaska branding ASAP once they have a single operating certificate. Same with the SF Giants plane.

Edit: These two liveries are decals. Effectively they're white-tails. Instead of taking new deliveries with the Virgin livery and repainting them later, they're taking new deliveries as all-white and using decals to spruce them up a little until they get the OK to take the full Alaska livery. Who knows if they'll stick around as special livery planes after that.

This is completely incorrect.

There are no regulations that require an airline being required to remain in its native livery.

Example A: Delta/Northwest. Delta sent a 747-400 to Victorville the day following the closure of the merger and painted the red tail into a widget. And this process was nearly completed by the actual cessation of NWA's operating certificate. A special ATC call-sign was initiated, "Northwest ___ in Delta colors."

JayWings wrote:

Tailwinds wrote:

The plane CAN'T yet have Alaska branding because it's a Virgin jet flying Virgin flights. If it were operating Alaska flights they could at least say Alaska Airlines operated by Virgin America, but that changeover hasn't happened yet. Expect this to go back in the paint shop for a Chester and Alaska branding ASAP once they have a single operating certificate. Same with the SF Giants plane.

Edit: These two liveries are decals. Effectively they're white-tails. Instead of taking new deliveries with the Virgin livery and repainting them later, they're taking new deliveries as all-white and using decals to spruce them up a little until they get the OK to take the full Alaska livery. Who knows if they'll stick around as special livery planes after that.

THIS POST HERE!

Now can we all breathe for a second? There is a sticker (just like in any other merger or acquisition of an airline) that says “Operated By Virgin America” by the door. When AS and VX have a single operating certificate, the decals will either be removed and the plane will be painted in full AS house livery or at least additional AS titles will be added. In the meantime they’re thinking on their feet and finding ways to keep new VX planes from being pure white or having to be repainted. This isn’t Boeing loyalists or some rebrand. It’s a one off quick fix until they can put their house livery on their plane.

Also, I’m not mad at how it looks, though it is incomplete. With a Chester tail and AS name on the forward fuselage it will even out.

Incorrect. See above.

I would add that the VX aircraft would need to have the "Operated by (FAA license number)" clearly visible on the aircraft.

DL did not originally do it with NWA aircraft branded DL before the single AOC and had to add the NW license to aircraft (in the case of 757's, next to door 2L).

n7371f wrote:

JayWings wrote:

Tailwinds wrote:

The plane CAN'T yet have Alaska branding because it's a Virgin jet flying Virgin flights. If it were operating Alaska flights they could at least say Alaska Airlines operated by Virgin America, but that changeover hasn't happened yet. Expect this to go back in the paint shop for a Chester and Alaska branding ASAP once they have a single operating certificate. Same with the SF Giants plane.

Edit: These two liveries are decals. Effectively they're white-tails. Instead of taking new deliveries with the Virgin livery and repainting them later, they're taking new deliveries as all-white and using decals to spruce them up a little until they get the OK to take the full Alaska livery. Who knows if they'll stick around as special livery planes after that.

THIS POST HERE!

Now can we all breathe for a second? There is a sticker (just like in any other merger or acquisition of an airline) that says “Operated By Virgin America” by the door. When AS and VX have a single operating certificate, the decals will either be removed and the plane will be painted in full AS house livery or at least additional AS titles will be added. In the meantime they’re thinking on their feet and finding ways to keep new VX planes from being pure white or having to be repainted. This isn’t Boeing loyalists or some rebrand. It’s a one off quick fix until they can put their house livery on their plane.

Also, I’m not mad at how it looks, though it is incomplete. With a Chester tail and AS name on the forward fuselage it will even out.

Incorrect. See above.

I would add that the VX aircraft would need to have the "Operated by (FAA license number)" clearly visible on the aircraft.

DL did not originally do it with NWA aircraft branded DL before the single AOC and had to add the NW license to aircraft (in the case of 757's, next to door 2L).

AOC Number isn’t required. Just the legal name.

keesje wrote:

Can't Alaska have their logo on the best jets if they aren't Boeing.

Maybe they better sell them to AA, Delta, Jetblue, Hawaiian or Spirit then.

I still think they should trade with Air Canada, then everyone would be happy.

Cubsrule wrote:

n7371f wrote:

JayWings wrote:

THIS POST HERE!

Now can we all breathe for a second? There is a sticker (just like in any other merger or acquisition of an airline) that says “Operated By Virgin America” by the door. When AS and VX have a single operating certificate, the decals will either be removed and the plane will be painted in full AS house livery or at least additional AS titles will be added. In the meantime they’re thinking on their feet and finding ways to keep new VX planes from being pure white or having to be repainted. This isn’t Boeing loyalists or some rebrand. It’s a one off quick fix until they can put their house livery on their plane.

Also, I’m not mad at how it looks, though it is incomplete. With a Chester tail and AS name on the forward fuselage it will even out.

Incorrect. See above.

I would add that the VX aircraft would need to have the "Operated by (FAA license number)" clearly visible on the aircraft.

DL did not originally do it with NWA aircraft branded DL before the single AOC and had to add the NW license to aircraft (in the case of 757's, next to door 2L).

AOC Number isn’t required. Just the legal name.

Correct. Bad wording on my behalf. It was NWA______. Too long to remember now.

rj777 wrote:

Is it just me or is there no AS logo on it anywhere?

They can’t until the merger is final

keesje wrote:

Can't Alaska have their logo on the best jets if they aren't Boeing.

Maybe they better sell them to AA, Delta, Jetblue, Hawaiian or Spirit then.

Not until after the merger is complete

HA_DC9 wrote:

Great plane, horrible livery. Shame on you AS.

It’s only temporary since it can’t be painted in AS colors

Crzn33k wrote:

rj777 wrote:

Is it just me or is there no AS logo on it anywhere?

They can’t until the merger is final

Not correct at all like others have tried to point out and there’s evidence against your claim.

They flew CO planes with the name United on it well before the merger was complete. The Delta A330 that was almost bombed was in DL paint but still 100% a NWA flight. Some US Airways planes were repainted to AA but still called Cactus. List goes on an on...