Condor is vacation. And vacation is stripes. Germany’s most popular leisure airline has a new brand identity: in the future, Condor will wear stripes in five colours. Inspired by parasols, bath towels and beach chairs, Condor is evolving into a distinctive and unique vacation airline.
“Condor has undergone a transformation over the past two and a half years: From a subsidiary of a vertically integrated travel group to an independent airline that looks back proudly on its history and tradition, while at the same time embarking on the path to the future. We want to express this unmistakably through our corporate identity: Condor is vacation and Condor is unmistakable – like our new design, with which we are now launching into the future,” says Ralf Teckentrup, CEO of Condor. “Our new trademark is stripes, our figurative mark stands for our origin and the colours for diversity. This triad is new, what remains is our passion. It has always made Condor unique and is therefore also reflected in our claim: Passion is our compass.”
The conception and creation of the new brand identity came about under the direction of Remo Masala, owner of the Vision Alphabet creative agency in Berlin. “Revising Condor’s brand identity with its long tradition is a delicate interplay based on respect for its origins and requirements for the future. Our goal was to endow Condor with a special visual independence, the rationale of which is united in Condor’s brand essence: the invention of the vacation flight, and the effective vacation code, the stripes of summer, joy and freedom.”
The corporate identity’s lead colours are yellow and blue. They have been complemented by the contrasting grey colour. The Condor signet, the condor in a circle, goes back to one of Germany’s most influential designers, Otl Aicher. The figurative mark has been given a facelift, with finer and more dynamic lines. It can be found again in the tail unit of the aircraft. The Condor lettering has also been adapted: It is now more compact, and the new lower case has made the wordmark more independent and consistent with the image. The logo appears in high-contrast black on the fuselage of the aircraft,” adds Teckentrup.
Initially, Condor’s aircraft will carry five colours in a striped look: yellow, red, blue, green, and beige stand for the facets of the diversity of Condor’s guests, employees, and the multitude of opportunities to discover the world with Condor.
The crew uniforms, accessories such as neckerchiefs, ties and pins will shine in the new design too, which will also make its way on board, to the airports, on the website, and on social media: in the coming weeks and months, many items on board will be replaced, such as cups, blankets and cutlery, as well as all materials on the ground such as boarding passes, ID cards and airport signage. The replacement will run successively, with nothing of old design being disposed of, but everything being used up. Around 80% of the fleet is to be repainted by 2024, because new paint jobs are due anyway. Condor is thus choosing the most sustainable way to redesign its brand identity and fleet.
The new design was unveiled in Toulouse with the first A330neo, which will take off for Condor in the fall. The first aircraft will of course take off with green stripes. The first Condor aircraft to fly with the new look is an Airbus A321 with the registration D-AIAD, which wears yellow stripes. In the upcoming weeks, five more Boeing 757 and Airbus A320/1 aircraft will be repainted, so that six aircraft will be flying in the new design in the summer flight schedule. They will mainly fly to Mallorca, Greece, the Canary Islands and Egypt.
