Purpose-led Branding

Our ambition at Airbus is to be the leader in sustainable aerospace. This doesn’t stop when it comes to design and applying our brand. Our brand is meant to give orientation and visibility in a meaningful and respectful manner, reflecting our company’s character.

Already during our recent re-branding projects Airbus has made sure that we consider de-brand versus re-branding. That means, we do not just replace everything that had been branded before but we only apply brand plates, wayfinding signs and signage where they are actually still needed for orientation. We avoid overbranding – loads of visible logos from one spot won’t make things better and are a waste of resources.

We also manage the size, the choice of material and the life span of signage together with our partners. We avoid out-of-scale applications. And we avoid short-lived applications that are soon to be disposed of.

The same applies to advertising placements – where possible we avoid brand placement with a short life span that is applied to surfaces which can not be reused or recycled.

We urge our advertising partners to pioneer new ways of brand presence that help us avoid avoidable use of resources. Digital advertising can help a lot here.

But managing digital data requires resources too. Tackling this aspect, the design of our websites has been adapted to minimise data processing and volume as much as possible.

We also urge our colleagues to avoid unnecessary printouts. In fact, the shift to digital collaboration has helped Airbus make a big step away from printouts, handwritten copies with individual notes and stacks of paper versions.

All our printers are set to black and white as a default. And with very few clicks you can even filter out background pictures and print two slides on a page etc.

Avoid big attachments in favour of collaborative documents in the G-Drive, reduce mail banners to the strict minimum necessary and avoid e-mail signatures including the Airbus logo – this helps reduce energy consumption for data processing.

We have erased all plastic packaging and material where possible. And we are trying to cut back on the overall range of promotional items, avoid customisation for small series (causes inefficient extra handling and transport).

We focus on good quality and longer lasting objects with a real utility and minimised environmental impact.

Of course above examples are just indicative of what we want to see happening as a normal behaviour across our company everyday. And we may not stop and continue to keep improving.

At the same time we may not over-promise. Greenwashing is a subject of serious debate and it can even come with substantial consequences. So let’s be serious but also always stay factual and transparent.

Here you can find the guidelines for communicating on Airbus climate and emissions related topics (for internals only).