Branding/awareness

Firm: Hermanoff Public Relations - Detroit
Client: Southwest Airlines
Specialty Area: Brand Development
Date: 11/10/1989


Southwest Airlines

Situation: In September 1987, Southwest Airlines held a joint press conference with city of Detroit officials to announce its service to Detroit City Airport. Over the next months, the airport would receive a $20 million expansion and renovation of its runways and terminal.

Objective: To continue to strengthen existing working relationships between the city and Southwest Airlines as they planned to jointly re-open City Airport to major, commercial air traffic for the first time in over 40 years. This ongoing, harmonious relationship would play an important role in future negotiations regarding the leasing of terminal space and the number of flights allowed to be scheduled by the carrier.

Action: Hermanoff initiated, scheduled and executed an unprecedented Economic Club of Detroit luncheon meeting in a City Airport hangar. Southwest Chairman and President Herbert Kelleher addressed 700 members of the Club with Detroit Mayor Coleman A. Young as presiding officer. The agency coordinated site specifics with City Airport officials.

The agency also coordinated a Southwest Airlines/city of Detroit joint press conference and official first flight ribbon-cutting ceremony as well as entertainment, catering and media relations with Detroit’s director of public information.

Evaluation: Media coverage was impressive for both events. During the ribbon cutting, over 800 people were in attendance, including Detroit and Wayne County officials, area business and economic leaders. Media referred to the launch as signalling “a new era for Detroit air travel.”

Hermanoff also coordinated media relations for a variety of Southwest programs. These included the arrival of Shamu One (Southwest’s Boeing 737-300 painted to look like a whale); Big Brothers/Big Sister Fly Up; Homes for the Holidays (fixed income seniors were united with loved ones at Christmas); and America Remembers (a program bringing Detroiters closer to U.S. servicemen deployed at sea during the holidays).

Our most successful was a national media relations campaign during Operation Desert Storm. Wall-sized cards were placed at each Southwest gate in airports throughout the U.S. Passengers signed the cards which were sent to servicemen and women on duty in the Persian Gulf region. The media coverage which resulted from this effort was incredible, and one of the highest Southwest ever experienced from a single program.