Alaska Airlines is about to launch its new loyalty program, Atmos Rewards, combining Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan and Hawaiian Airlines HawaiianMiles. The name was leaked but we know nothing else about the branding.
We’re supposed to learn more this month ahead of an October 1 conversion of HawaiianMiles into the new program. There haven’t been any statements from Alaska Airlines explaining the name “Atmos Rewards” that I’ve seen – no branding rationale, timeline for a rollout, or even indication of which agency is behind the branding.
Wow, This Is Gonna Be Expensive!
Naming work from a top-tier branding consultancy will involve research, competitor audits, linguistic and trademark screening, focus groups, and iterative design work. To merge two airline loyalty programs you’re probably looking at $1 million in branding work alone.
Then you need to promote the new name and transfer brand equity from two well-known programs into the new one. This involve paid media, social, email, inflight video, airport signage, and partner promotions. Remember also that all of the existing collateral – both online and in meat space – needs to be updated as well.
To reach parity in awareness within 12 – 18 months you’re probably spending $20 – $30 million in the first year at least, though a more aggressive campaign could cost $50 million.
Is Atmos A Good Name?
“Atmos” is vaguely evocative of ‘atmosphere’ or flying and sky. This is relevant to both pre-existing brands and likely carefully avoids favoring one over the other.
It’s short and easy to pronounce. It’s trademarkable. And it should work well across many languages, which is good for Alaska as they ‘go global’ with flights to both Europe and Asia.
On the other hand, both Mileage Plan and HawaiianMiles have decades of recognition and emotional attachment. “Atmos Rewards” starts at zero.
And it’s generic. It could be used in just about any context. It could be a tech brand. It could be a fragrance! Spray yourself with some Atmos and become irresistible! There’s really no immediate communication of miles and points and travel rewards, which means more spending required to establish the brand.
What Actually Makes A Great Brand?
ChatGPT is probably the best recent brand. How many people even know that GPT is a generative pre-training transformer or what that means? But when we first saw a chat tool interacting with AI, we were amazed. The name is great because it’s associated with the thing that’s great, and it’s now a better brand that Anthropic’s Claude, Google’s Gemeni or Meta’s Llama. The name can be clunky if the underlying product delights.
On the other hand, you want to ditch the brand if it has a bad reputation like in The Wire: change the name of the product.
Marriott invested in the generic and meaningless ‘Bonvoy’ and then had to spend heavily to give it meaning. But the botched roll out of the program, which included disappearing member status and account history, imbued it with meaning: getting Bonvoy’d became derogatory – akin to getting ‘hosed’ or subjected to a comedy of errors.
What they really should have done is just resurrected the old ‘Marriott Honored Guest’ name both because it was new to most members and because it would have appeared to also be a nod to Starwood Preferred Guest whose members were getting folded into the new program.
At the very least it would have kept the focus on the guest, which is something that’s felt missing from the brand since the Starwood deal. Marriott’s CEO famously says that they’ll put ‘net rooms growth’ on his tombstone. The corporate priority is mollifying owners, not delivering value to guests. And this is done through reduced program costs, including shifting the cost of free night awards onto members by passing on resort and destination fees (something neither Hilton nor Hyatt do).
Air Canada, on the other hand, launched its new program five years ago after buying it buy from Aimia. They considered giving it a new name. But they already had one of the best, most recognizable brands in Canada. Over time investing in a new name and elevating that name to the stature of what they already had would have been a nine figure investment. Better to put that money into the program itself!
Ultimately a great brand is something you establish with a great product. Brand awareness is terrible for a bad product – it accelerates negative sentiment! Spend the money on a great product, rather than great marketing of a terrible one. Be Be Trader Joe’s, Apple and ChatGPT – not Spirit Airlines! And unless you’re trying to escape a name, don’t invest in a new one even if you’re merging two companies like BB&T and SunTrust becoming ‘Truist’.
You could have brought up Hyatt’s questionable decision to move away from the beloved :”Hyatt Gold Passport” and its “Passport Points” name to the bland “World of Hyatt” name which did exactly nothing for anyone. of course no name means anything if there’s no substance behind it…
Wonder how Dolby will feel about this (shocked they don’t have it trademarked already?!)…
Not a good name, at least in areas like Dallas served by Atmos Energy. They have a history of poor maintenance and gas explosions, with several resulting in deaths. That’s the first thing I thought of when I saw “Atmos”.
They should have spent the money on figuring out how to provide special meals when meals are served. To me they are the airline that doesn’t care about us.
@ Gary — I can see it now: “You miles will be worth Atmos 0.8 cents each!”
Sounds weird. I would have preferred they take the other half of atmosphere…”Sphere”, sounds better to me.
@Gene — Yep, I can see that too!
Eh, TBD. Not awe-inspiring but the proof is in the pudding. If it’s an awesome program, call it whatever you want. If it’s not, prepare to be Bonvoy’d.
Alaska Airlines is so brand confused.
They say the Alaska brand is so great that it is worth starting new routes from Seoul and Tokyo to Seattle but not as great as Hawaiian which has flown to those cities for years and yet flights from Seoul and Tokyo to Hawaii will still be under the Hawaiian brand. Say what?
and now they throw in another brand that is not connected to either AS or HA.
Atmos Energy operates from Virginia to Colorado and Dolby Atmos is still fairly well known.
this merger feels far more like the amateur hour than the Virgin America acquisition
First there are rumors they’re getting rid of Chester (the smiling eskimo (?) face on the tail) and now this.
Jesus Alaska, un-F your IT. Fix the upgrade processor. Invest in IRROPS.
But no, they waste money on a pointless rebrand.
I can understand the idea of picking a new name that “favors” neither AS or HA, even though there is little doubt who took over whom (which took over what?). While I grant you, “Atmos” is not as bad as “Bonvoy,” it is far from the best option that could have created for the new program. Heck, if the trademark protection expired, they could have used VX’s “Elevate!” — for those who don’t remember, or don’t care, Virgin America’s mileage program began as “Elevate!” and later dropped the exclamation point.
Then again, has anyone ever joined or dropped out of a mileage/points program because of that program’s name?
And yes, (@Ex-UA Plat) Chester is going away — Alaska has already released pictures of the new livery — but (FWIW) I have only been “F’d up” by their IT once in 133 flights,. That happened last weekend and appears to be due to human error. But while I haven’t experienced the problems that you apparently have, basically EVERY carrier should be constantly fixing/improving their IT…
I hope we don’t get Atmosed like we got Bonvoyed a few years back.
Is anyone really that concerned what they call their mileage program? Regardless of what they call it is still one of the best mileage programs out there.
And @Jason, Chester isn’t going anywhere. He will remain on all the narrowbody aircraft. Just not on the Global livery.
Well done, @Gene. You have the best comment so far. *chef’s kiss*
THIS !! => “Jesus Alaska, un-F your IT. Fix the upgrade processor. Invest in IRROPS.”
Mileage Plan is a fine name…yeah, its boring, but works for HA and AS “brands”
But again the CMO/SVP of Branding probably is wanting some big “change” on their resume with the help of some outside agency that will never say “gee your brand is great, you shouldn’t change it”
ATMOS is used as a trademarked name in a lot of areas from financial institutions to scuba gear.
When I hear the name ATMOS, I think of the mix of solid and liquid fine particles suspended in the atmosphere. These fine particles like PM2.5, pose significant health risks because they can be inhaled deep into the lungs and even enter the bloodstream exacerbating deadly respiratory issues like asthma. Currently, wildfire smoke from Canada is a major source of particulate matter, but it’s also produced by other sources like vehicles and industrial processes. Accordingly, I will think of both Alaska Airlines and, air pollution every time I see or hear the new ATMOS brand name.
Atmos Rewards feels vague and risks confusing guests when clarity should be the priority. Alaska should use this moment to launch a strong, unified identity such as “Northern Pacific Airways,” or a similar name that is traditional, geographically relevant, and symbolic of a new chapter. A fresh, single brand could ultimately build more equity than either legacy name can moving forward, especially as the route network continues to grow. Passing on that opportunity now may ultimately prove to be a costly mistake.
Isn’t Atmos what the move Spaceballs was all about?
‘Atmos’ meets autocorrect is gonna be interesting.
So many misinformed “experts.”
The Chester logo is not going away. It will not be included on one aircraft type: AS’ newly branded 787s, which will be primarily used to serve international destinations.
First it was Virgin America. Now it’s Hawaiian. If Alaska can afford these airlines, it can afford the expensive rebranding/advertising.
Speaking of Alaska (the state), did y’all hear our Lard and Savor (#45/47) plans to meet with Pootler next week? I know, TDS. Anyway, where’s @Mike P to tell us how those commies feel about this over in Moscow…
Mike,
the name that best describes what AS is trying to be is… Western Airlines… but I’m guessing Delta has that name locked in a vault never to be used again.
and, yes, Elevate would have been a good loyalty program name.
1990,
I have a feeling that the national CEO is going to highlight what happens in real estate deals when you lose focus on what matters.
I swear half of the problems we are dealing w/ as a world is due to remorse for selling Alaska to the US
http://www.atmosenergy.com (texas natural gas) will have a lawsuit pending soon?
@Tim Dunn — You’re not wrong, sir.
Sounds a lot like At Most, as in you’ll get mediocre value at most.
Spending a lot of money on the Atmos name is wasted. No airline frequent flyer name is so good that it rakes in money because of the name. Some of the simpler names work fine…
United Airlines MileagePlus
American Airlines AAdvantage (sort of weird, crAAppy weird)
Delta Airlines Skymiles
Lufthansa Miles and More
ANA Mileage Club
The weird ones, which may be Atmos, are weird
They should have stuck with Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan or even Alaska Airlines HawaiianMiles
El Al Matmid
EVA Air Infinity MileageLands (what’s a mileageland?)
Why spend any money marketing it? Everyone knows all the airlines have programs and don’t care about the name. No one will choose AS over someone else for the name
This is dumb name.
Dumb.
@derek — You forget that they likely paid a consultant all that money so that if it doesn’t go well, then they/CEO/board, etc. can just blame/sue the consultant/company, instead of taking responsibility for bad ideas… USA! USA! USA!
@ derek
EVA’s ‘Infinite MileageLands’ is that fantastically ‘nirvanic’ yet mythical world where all unlimited mileage accruals are instantly redeemable/confirmable in any desired class to any desired destination … even including alliance partners. Oh, and instant access to your exclusive & iconic a al carte private EVA lounge dining room accompanied by pre-selected eponymous live eclectic ‘entertainment’ !
Stay tuned for the pending patent/trademark lawsuit filed by IAG’s ‘Avios’ ‘rewards’ program….
@ 1990 — It’s a pretty safe bet the meeting in Alaska will be futile. AGAIN.
@bossa — Still better than Turkish ‘miles&smiles’… just ‘frowns&clowns’ over there.
Gene,
if he is on US soil, we can wrestle him and not let him up until we get what we want (Ukraine to be safe again)
oh, and being able to overfly Russia again would be a nice bonus.
they would probably like some spare parts for their Boeings
@1990 – Miles & Smiles is indeed pretty bad. Whenever I read it too fast, it somehow registers as “Miles & Smells.” Then my mind wanders and I think of all the tagline possibilities…
“Earning status one whiff at a time.”
“Because not every cabin smell is complimentary.”
“Loyalty has an odor, and it’s not roses.”
“Your luggage may be lost, but that aroma on your clothes is forever.”
recalling “Malice in Dallas” in ’92, SW started using the slogan “Plane Smart”, discovered Stevens in SC already used it. Herb decided to arm-wrestle its CEO for the rights .. 4,500 SW employees in an old wrestling building cheering, Herb exercising by lifting a huge bottle of Wild Turkey, pleaded for time out to smoke a cigarette, cheated, finally lost. Stevens gave it to SW ’cause Herb put up such a good battle, as Herb called for a stretcher to take him out of the ring. Great media coverage, NBC Evening News did a long segment on it. As opposed to spending tens of millions with lawyers ..
Big Waste of Money and what a Dumb name!!! , give us back our good Value rewards……First Class on JAL, or Qantas, these and many more gone with the(once) best little Airline, ….
As long as they fix the insane IT posting issues and the mess that is the MP program right now….then i dont care what its called.
The missing and wrong posting of flights on AS is just insane…..Gary should do a post about that….ill go first….my porter flights bought with AS miles are posting as revenue…..AS bought tickets posting as partner flights…constant calling in for every single flight these days.
I was so confused when I saw the headline, wondering why AS was forging a loyalty partnership with the largest U.S. natural gas provider. Beyond awful.
I do see changing the name (to something much better than this!) as a positive, so they can have a brand without the same initials as UA’s loyalty program.
Well, it could have been worse. They could have called it Alaska Sky-Pesos
Assmost, Assmist, Askmuch, Asmuch, I could go on but some slang term will evolve out if this.
@Mike Hunt — Bahaha. Their program indeed stinks. I don’t mind their newer aircraft, 787 and a350 (which I think were ironically meant for Aeroflot, because it’s orange and blue theme inside, instead of the typical Turkish black and red, but, you know, war of choice, sanctions, ‘no (plane) for you.’) However, their older 777 (2-2-2) and a330s are a hard-product disappointment; once, 7+ hour flight ‘lie-flat’ broken. Rough redeye, to say the least. Their food is decent (cute how they have on-board chefs with hats), and the new airport at IST is impressive. And their network is extensive; a lot of unique destinations that others simply do not serve. Otherwise, there are better carriers and programs out there. Like, I much prefer QR or EK.
Here we have a small town airline, Alaska Airlines, attempting to be a “GLOBAL AIRLINE” with no experience in doing so. Aircrafts lack amenities, food service and inflight services lack “INTERNATIONAL” quality and IT Dept. and marketing has no clue what it’s doing. And now a confused mileage program with two airline names from Alaska Airlines and Hawaiian Airlines.
@Tim Dunn & @Gene — Feels very 1938 Munich Agreement, to me. ‘Just give him a chunk of Czech.. that should do..’ or here, ‘Crimea and Donbas.’ If I were in Georgia (country, not Atlanta, ah, so Delta’s safe!) or Moldova, I would not celebrate such a quick deal of appeasement, because ‘peace’ doesn’t mean ‘justice,’ it just means a temporary cessation of hostilities. Recall this all goes back to 1994, when we, the UK, former USSR, new Russia and new Ukraine agreed it would give up its nukes for security guarantees. That was the original contract that was breached since the illegal annexation of Crimea in 2014 and the subsequent full-on invasion by Putin in 2022. While I’m critical of #45/47, he’s not Hitler; Putin is Hitler (and Xi could be ‘the Emperor’) in this round of history repeating itself. I’ve said many times on here, so is Xi gonna actually go for Taiwan by 2027, because that’s the real ‘game changer,’ would be WW3, and certainly affects our industry, as aviation and travel becomes more about ‘the war’ and not about ‘business’ or ‘fun.’ Anyhoo… happy Saturday!
thanks for the levity to start the weekend, 1990.
but, yeah, aviation has always been connected and subject to geopolitics.
decisions have consequences which aren’t easily undone. and someone is always ready to “game the system”
the interesting part is that a meeting would be in Alaska rather than the UAE as was originally proposed.
now returning to our previously scheduled brand confusion programming.
@Tim Dunn — You are quite the diplomat, sir. Bringing us back from the brink!
Yes, I’d’ve expected UAE, namely because most of the wealthier Russians who escaped conscription went there (and Istanbul, Phuket, Colombo, Bali, etc.) Really, any of those, and ideally somewhere without extradition or ICC jurisdiction.
As for Alaska’s branding, as I said in Gary’s related post, I still think AS’s new 787 livery is ‘hot.’ Like, visually appealing. Aqua marine. Me like-y.
I’m also a fan of when airlines do a retro-livery. I wish Delta would bring back a paint job from each era in celebration of its centennial. At least the current safety video is a good one!
And yet Alaska and Hawaiian airlines probably have higher percentages of customers bonded to their brands than any other US airlines which is why they are keeping both brands. See Lufthansa Group if you want to see this in action. Alaska is going to be just fine.
JL,
AS and HA both do well because they are the largest carrier in their markets. AS particularly has pretty strong advantages which limit competitor growth. Warren Buffett calls that a moat and it is part of why the big 3 and WN have done well; even though they don’t lock out any competitors – as much as some people want to believe otherwise – they do have a high enough market share that they can command fare premiums and loyalty. and AS DID learn their lesson because they tried to take on UA esp. via Virgin America and never had the market strength. It is very much a legitimate question whether AS will be able to break into international markets where it is smaller and the newcomer in markets where there are multiple other airlines.
I am pretty sure that the big 3 have just as high of loyalty in their strength market hubs and based on sheer size, SEA and HNL are quite a bit down the list in terms of hub sizes.
The LH Group is based on countries; no US airline has maintained two separate brands that are named for two different states even as they try to expand into international markets and then add yet a third brand for their mileage program.
Sounds just like British Airways Aveos. It conjures up no connection to BA or to airlines in general, but I think it’s only a matter of time before you’ll be able to earn Atmos points with your Chase Visa at Walmart, and then redeem them there, too.
Alaska Airlines, or its partners, will just become one of many places to use you miles…er…”points”.
@ 1990 — No, the fat disgusting orange cow IS HITLER. Federalization of DC is one of the key pieces for Project 2029 (the coming Coup Part 2). The entire District can serve as a fortress to keep out the radical left wing liberal socialist democrat pizza parlor crazies!
That optimism that I had that ‘Merica could survive is GONE. We are collectively screwed. Maybe a 2025 cocaine-induced acute myocardial infarction could stil save us?
@Gene — You know, I’m no fan of the renditioning of people to random country’s gulags, suspension of due process, habeas corpus, Alligator Alcatraz/Auschwitz (no, it’s not overreacting), masked, unidentified Gestapo-like ICE agents rounding up anyone ‘brown’ because they can… all that’s really freaking bad. Like, mid-1930s bad.
As for where things go from here, yeah, the guys that concern me most are Stephen Miller and Russel Vought, because those guys could ‘finish the job’ on a right-wing Christo-fascist forever regime here, with the current guy, Vance, or whoever. Judiciary, Congress, media, and most other institutions are already quite compromised. If they gerrymander to the extent they seem to be planning, even a blow-out turnout for Dems won’t mean anything.
All that’s said, whenever I go out side, and ‘touch grass’ as my foes tell me to, everyone seems calm, normal, etc. Odd.
Oh jeez… when the comments reach 50, they go to a new page, so my wild stuff is gonna be at the top. Sorry, folks, for the lack of content. Bah!
LOL, my immediate reaction to “Atmos” was to think of Atmos Energy, a publicly traded natural gas utility company in Texas.
Maybe Hawaiian could get their existing stuff to work. Huaka”I makes lots of promises and delivers nothing.
Too many MBAs! Spend the millions on rewards and call it fly.
Anyone else remember the episode of Doctor Who where Atmos is the brand of product that is spewing noxious gases? According to IMDB, it was season 4, episode 4, with David Tennant as the Doctor.
They should stick with Mileage Plan, but the new name is certainly better than Bonvoy or Infinity MileageLands…
@ 1990 — Well, at least the Facists haven’t found a way to gerrymander the Senate races, YET. I think the Dems still have a good chance to flip the House even with gerrymandering. If we were already going to have a 25-35 seat flip, the gerrymandering won’t be enough to prevent the house from flipping a handful of seats. Anyone want to start a bet on Trump’s final impeachment count by the end of #47 — 3? 4? maybe 5?
This is from the US trademark search website. They have three pending US Trademarks:
1. ATMOS
IC 036: Issuance of credit cards.; IC 039: Air transportation services
Class 036, 039 Serial 98761852
Owners AS Mileage Plan IP Ltd. (limited company (ltd.); Cayman Islands)
2. ATMOS
Class 039 100 105.
G & S: IC 039: Airport services featuring transit lounge facilities for passenger relaxation.
Serial 98761824
Owners Alaska Airlines, Inc. (CORPORATION; Alaska, USA)
3. ATMOS REWARDS
Class 039 100 105.
G & S: IC 039: Air transportation services featuring a frequent flyer bonus program.
Class 039
Serial 98837715
Owners AS Mileage Plan IP Ltd. (limited company (ltd.); Cayman Islands)
@ Danny — Very cool.
The trademark applications were submitted on November 5, 2024 so they have been working on this plan for at least for 10 months.
The acquisition of Hawaiian Airlines, which was announced in December 2023, was finalized on September 18, 2024.
They removed “Mile” from the name to prepare to go money-based instead of the current mileage-based program.
“ATMOS”….
sounds like… and is like….
“BONVOY”
Well now we know what happened to the fresh biz skool MBAs who destroyed Marriott’s program in the name of the hipster happening futuristic REBRAND! LOL!
I remain at your service to denounce the DL and BA borgs as well as ATMOS…
bestinclassredtailshark@gmail.com
@redtailshark — ‘Make it so!’ Are you sure you aren’t the offspring of @Erect, @Un, etc.?