United Airlines
Enhancing a pitch and historic brand reboot with daring and effective digital.
B2C: Pitch concepts, creative direction, copywriting, UX/UI, innovation ideation, digital creative lead
Collaborators: Jen Andrews, Russ Phillips, Pawel Sokalsky, David Papworth
I was digital creative lead on a pitch that was a cornerstone of mcgarrybowen’s Agency of The Year award, winning United Airlines’ AOR pitch. One of the agency’s largest pitches to date, I worked hand-in-hand with the agency’s top teams, generating strong and progressive digital enhancements to core ideas.
We won the pitch. And we nearly launched that winning campaign. Instead, the airline made a last-second pivot, asking us to reboot their legendary 1970s/80s “Fly The Friendly Skies.” We did that, too.
This is a sampler of two campaigns. I led the digital teams on both: ideating, directing, presenting, writing, flying everywhere…
The winning pitch:
We won the pitch on a core idea by my buddy Christian Carl, with the airline promising they would OUTFLY all others. It was a bold promise for an airline ranked near the bottom of CSAT scores. But they wanted to go big and bold.
This is a sampler of the work I led, ideated and wrote for, and presented in the winning pitch — dozens of progressive and traditional digital ideas:
Reimagining the United app
It all begins with an idea. Maybe you want to launch a business. Maybe you want to turn a hobby into something more. Or maybe you have a creative project to share with the world. Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference.
Augmented Reality Ticket Drop Concept
One of our favorite ideas almost came to be: a virtual ticket drop for the launch, held in cities around the country. It was on the table until a late-breaking budget cut dropped it from the launch campaign. It still ranks as a legendary near-miss our team still laments at every reunion:
The launch campaign:
As we were prepping OUTFLY for takeoff, a United board member taxied in and recommended to the CEO to reboot United’s legacy “Fly the Friendly Skies” campaign. mcgarrybowen argued no, as it promised something the airline wasn’t really delivering; it ranked near the bottom of customer satisfaction scores. But we found a way to modernize the old slogan, suggesting we were working on building a more “flyer friendly” airline.
I led the digital team through the launch, adding copywriting, ideation, UX/UI design, social media, strategy, presentation, and hand-in-hand consultation with the client — many flights back and forth from Austin to Chicago. Occasionally, the skies actually were friendly, too.
