North American Design Competition 2022

Hello all and welcome to the second annual North American Design Competition sponsored by Sierra Pacific. My name is Boeing Flight Simulator and I will be the host of this year's competition alongside Airplano21, DET and J.L. 747. We are happy to welcome you to this year's competition and hope you have as much fun designing as we did setting this up for you all. Now without further adieu we will get into the guidelines for this year's competition.

First off the changes from last year's competition.

• Brands made after November 21st 2021 are eligible for entry, This will allow for a larger pool of entries (as after all there is a lot of room available for new or past brands to intermingle)

• Auxiliary branding will now be a fundamental part of the submission contributing to the overall score of any submitted brands. This will now count for 10 points out of each submission.

Now onto categories, There will be four categories to this competition same as last year,

• A. Full Service/Mainline Carriers (Ex. United, Air Canada)

• B. Low Cost Carriers/Ultra Low Cost Carriers (Ex. Spirit, Frontier, Volaris)

• C. Regional Airlines (Ex. Endevor, Air Wisconsin, Denver Air Connect)

• D. Cargo and Charter Carriers (Ex. National, Polar, FedEx Express)

Entry Guidelines

Each Participant is limited to one entry per category. (No Reserving Space)

Entries must be from the modern era 1995-2022

Each entry must either be from scratch or posted on the gallery after November 21st 2021

All submissions must have a short lore post. 10-25 sentences

Participants must include a separated livery and logo, At least one piece of Auxiliary branding is also required but there is no cap on Auxiliary branding. Failure to include aux branding will be an immediate loss of 10 points. 

Credit sources ex. If you did not make your logo and it is found it is not your logo (without Credit) points will be docked from the final score. 

Entries must originate from the United States, Canada, Greenland, Burmuda, and Mexico. This includes Hawaii and Puerto Rico.

Entries must follow this criteria

[Group] Airline Name] IATA, ICAO, CALLSIGN, HQ] Era of Submission:]

Example: [Group A] Northern Airlines] IATA: NO ICAO: NAS CALLSIGN: Northern HQ: Chicago IL] 2022 ]

MAP

Judging Criteria

Airlines will be judged off of the following,

Creativity, How does this airline stand out from the other competitors and how well does it fit into the chosen environment and group: 0/10

Design principles. How well executed is the brand and its overall design? 0/10

Logo and Branding Elements . How well is the logo and how well is the overall brand put together (Not counting livery kist logo and typeface) 0/5

Auxillary Branding. How well does it fit into its area or target audience, how well put together is examples provided for judging 0/10

Bio and Lore of airlines. Is it correct for the era? (1995/2022) 0/5

The score will be out of 50 

All submissions will be due by 12/2/2022 1:00AM UTC time

Happy Designing from the NADC 2 panel!

Group B | Texjet [TJ] [TXJ] | ICAO: LONGHORN | HQ: Austin-Bergstrom Airport, Texas | Livery 2018

Texjet is a premium low-cost carrier with its headquarters in downtown Austin, Texas.

Formed in 1999, the airline initially operated a small fleet consisting of 737-300 aircraft operating regional routes within the state of Texas. The airline acquired 757-200 aircraft in 2004 and began transcontinental operations across the United States, as well as routes into Canada and Mexico as well as the Caribbean. In 2007, Texjet announced a large order of over 80 737NG aircraft, comprised of the 800 and 900 variants. Texjet announced a codeshare and interlining agreement with Emirati lowcost airline Marhaba in 2019, with Marhaba launching a DXB-JFK-IAH triangle route.  Following the grounding of the 737 MAX in 2019, the airline was forced to lease up to 30 737-800 aircraft to cover for the fleet losses suffered. 

Texjet's current livery incorporates the Texas Longhorn, an iconic symbol of Texas and the face of the brand since its launch. 

The airline operates hubs at Austin-Bergstrom, Houston Intercontinental, Dallas-Love Field and San Antonio airports. 

Current fleet (as of November 2022)

• 36 Boeing 737-871
• 37 Boeing 737-971ER
• 51 Boeing 737 MAX 8
• 6 Boeing 737 MAX 9
• 21 Boeing 757-271
• 11 Boeing 757-371

Group 2 | Magical Airlines [M6/MAX] | ICAO: MAGICAL ONE | HQ: Baltimore, Maryland, USA | Hubs: CMH, BNA, BWI| Founded: 2003


Magical Airlines [M6|MAX] was founded in Q3 of 2000 by entrepreneur Brant DeSoto. The airline was envisioned to offer low fares to passengers, and performing underserved routes, using a more point to point basis as their business model. Initially, things looked promising for the airline, as they would be able to hold a strong position by using a point to point model for lower fares than the traditional hub-and-spoke model. However, the skies would turn gloomy in 2001, when 9/11 occured. The aftermath of 9/11 caused a downturn in travel demand globally, and many doubted that MAX would make it through. Indeed, a couple investors pulled out, putting MAX in an even worse position. However, DeSoto and his team persevered, and eventually placed an order with Airbus in January of 2002 for 15 Airbus A320s - a surprise to many, as Boeing’s 737NG product seemed the obvious choice. DeSoto commented on this, saying that, “The Boeing 737 was - and still is - a great product, and in a different time we probably would have ordered it. But at the time, the A320 presented a number of benefits, such as a shorter backlog, and a great deal was struck with Airbus giving us a nice discount on the jets.” It should be noted that it was a surprise to many that MAX decided to buy entirely new aircraft, instead of going second hand. DeSoto also commented on this, saying that, “I’m gonna be honest that the second hand market at the time was mostly older, less efficient aircraft. The A320 was pretty new technology at this time, as was the 737 Next Gen, so you couldn’t really find them used anywhere. But our magical team of financial advisors decided that a newer fleet would be worth it in the long run, as it presented a number of benefits to us…” 

After another rocky 18 months, Airbus handed over the first Airbus A320-214 to MAX. Registered N110MA, it flew from its Hamburg birthplace to Columbus’ John Glenn International Airport via Reykjavik’s Keflavik Airport. CMH was going to be the first “hub” of the airline, although MAX had no plans to keep a hub and spoke, outlining 8 different cities that they planned to fly to within the first six months of operation (see map below). Additionally, MAX was able to secure slots at airports that they otherwise would not have been able to, due to lower travel demand caused by the aforementioned 9/11 attacks. While the routes on the initial network were not too hard to obtain,  MAX successfully acquired slots at Washington’s Reagan Airport (DCA), as well as Boston’s Logan Airport (BOS). Both airports would play a part in the first network expansion that MAX would do. While serving both DCA and BWI seemed odd at first, it was ultimately advantageous to MAX, as they were able to take a significant part of the Washington D.C market share early on. Today, MAX is the largest operator out of BWI, and the third largest out of DCA. MAX also obtained Chicago Midway slots (MDW), and New York/Newark (EWR) slots. All of this was possible because of US mainline carriers cutting flights during the downturn in travel during the post-9/11 time, causing more slots to be available at lower prices.

Finally, on December 23, 2003, Magical Airlines’ first flight occurred. Using N110MA, it carried 175 passengers from Columbus to Tampa. The flight lasted for just over three hours, and was almost half regular fare paying passengers, many of whom had no idea that they had booked on a first flight. For the first three months of operations, MAX would fly a triangle route from Tampa to Nashville to Columbus and then reversing. But as 2004 went along, MAX added ten more A320s. By September, they announced their first route expansion 

At this point, Magical Airlines stopped expanding their network as much, and would not expand into any large international airports in the near future. It would not be until 2009 that they would expand into some larger airports out west - namely Las Vegas, Seattle, and San Diego. The norm became adding a few shorter routes on the east coast to new airports every few months.

It was full speed ahead from this 2004 expansion. In June of 2005, MAX placed another order for a further 15 A320s, with options for 20 more. By early 2005, they had repaid all their loans to the respective shareholders. By 2006, the 500,000th passenger boarded a MAX flight. Throughout these years, the airline kept getting more passengers, and kept on growing. By October of 2006, they converted their 20 options for A320s into an order for ten A320s and ten A319s. These smaller A319s would be used to fly into smaller airports with lower demand, and the first one was due for delivery by 2009. Besides that, MAX constantly had healthy load factors, with 80% of their flights having at least as many seats filled.

Unfortunately, dark clouds appeared in 2007, when the United States went into the Great Recession. The stock market had essentially crashed, and it impacted MAX significantly, as there was a sharp downturn in load factors. In November of 2006, MAX flew thirty flights a day carrying over 120 passengers each. In the same month of the next year, they would fly twenty flights a day. They would seldom fill up an aircraft. This led to the temporary suspension of services to several airports. 

Recovery from the Great Recession was slow, but gradual. By the end of 2009, 70% of flights had an 80% load factor, and some routes were slowly resuming. In this time, MAX had bought slots in New Orleans, planning for a large expansion in the summer of 2010.
In 2010, MAX announced its’ largest ever route expansion, which made its’ network 10% larger. It added many smaller destinations that largely buffed MAX’s network. In this year, they also added their first A319, which wore an all-purple livery. 

Growth was strong throughout the 2010s, with the airline doubling in size between 2010 and 2015. It was in this year that MAX began negotiations with the USDOT to fly to Canada, eyeing destinations like Hamilton, Ottawa, Regina, Edmonton, and Winnipeg. This endeavor took years, and it was not until June of 2021 that MAX flew their inaugural flight to Canada. MAX had also partaken in a fleet expansion during this time, boasting over 200 aircraft, all A319 and A320ceos. 

In 2020, MAX announced that they would be rebranding the airline for their first A321neos - which were truly a new chapter in Magical Airlines’ history. It was not until 2021 that this livery would be unveiled on their first A321-200N, which featured a purple cheatline along an off-white fuselage, adorning Magical colors.
Now, in 2022, MAX has been planning for the future. DeSoto continues to manage the airline, although he has hinted at an eventual retirement in the next decade. In a recent press conference in October, DeSoto announced that MAX was “...exploring options for sustainable flight to reach a goal of net zero emissions before 2050.” Unlike many similar carriers, MAX has announced no interest in the prospect of eVTOL aircraft. “They are not our business model. We aren’t a commuter airline; we are a ‘get places’ airline. I think that the eVTOLs are a great technology, but I also believe that they have received enough commitment from other carriers that the technology can reach perfection in a timely manner without necessitating our intervention.” Nonetheless, MAX has still been publicly announcing investments into sustainable aircraft - namely Wright Electric’s planned 100 seat aircraft. “100 seats is a drop in capacity for sure, but it’s not huge, and I see such a capacity as being able to support further expansion into smaller airports.” CFO Greg Lemrick said at the same conference. MAX’s biggest problem has been the lack of larger aircraft to enter the market. This was reiterated multiple times during this thrice mentioned conference, by multiple executives at MAX. Put simply, MAX plans to buy the first 150 seater that enters the market with zero emissions, and replace their A320neos with it.

(NEW LIVERY HAS NOT YET BEEN MADE)

https://imgur.com/Uh...gur.com/lXxdswn

Group C | Hopper [HP/HOP] | ICAO: HOPPER | HQ: San Francisco | Hubs: SFO, LAX, LAS | Founded: 2013

Hopper was founded on March 3rd, 2013 in San Francisco. The first flight was operated on August 17th from SFO to SMF on an ERJ-135. The airline now operates ERJ-135s and ERJ-145s from SFO and LAX to more than 25 destinations destinations all around the southwest United States. Hopper was founded to make regional travel easier in the southwestern United States. 

FOUNDED IN 1969, Compass Air Service is a regional carrier based in Milwaukee, Wisconsin with its main hub at Minneapolis's Saint Paul International Airport. Operating a fleet of eleven Beechcraft 1900 series aircraft - eight 1900Ds and three 1900Cs - the airline provides air services to 23 destinations across the northern Midwest. The majority of Compass' routes are subsidized by the Essential Air Service (EAS) program, which is largely how the airline profits off operations to small towns with little demand. 

The airline began operations in Milwaukee in 1969 with a pair of BN-2 Islanders, becoming one of the first American operators of the British type. Since then, the aircraft has operated a plethora of small regional aircraft including Twin Otters, Cessna Caravans and Piper 31s. The airline started off linking Milwaukee with Chicago's Midway airport twice a day before branching off to smaller towns, where the grass airstrips were ideal operating environments for the airline's high-winged twin engine aircraft. Compass signed an interline agreement with Valiant Airways nearly a decade later in in 1978, providing feeder services into the mainline carrier's Milwaukee hub to provide greater transcontinental service connections to the northern contiguous United States. The airline began expansion out of Minneapolis after Valiant began shrinking its Milwaukee hub in the 1980s, where a majority of Compass operations occur today.

Today, the airline maintains a close connection with Valiant, enjoying codeshare privileges on most Valiant flights out of Milwaukee and Minneapolis. In 2020, the airline placed an order for five Tecnam P2012s.

[Group A Westwind WW, WST, Westwind, San Diego]

Westwind was a major American carrier based in San Diego with hubs at San Diego and San Francisco. A thoroughly Californian company, Westwind was known for operating in a manner different than its competitors. For one, unlike most American major carriers, Westwind confined itself to the Western portion of the United States. Apart from its two hubs, its focus city in Salt Lake City rounded out its network. The airline figured it understood the Western market and shouldn’t take its chances with other hub markets. The airline was well known for its extensive and historic network of flights across the Pacific Ocean and even though it almost entirely abrogated the transatlantic market, the airline was a major player amongst Transpacific and Hawaiian flights. Management was known for its aversion to change – seeing rapid change as akin to chaos. The airline operated a unitype narrowbody fleet entirely consisting of A320, 319, and 321 aircraft. On the larger side, the airline operated a somewhat more varied fleet of 767 variants and 777-200ERs. Fleet numbers were called fleet designators because they included a combination of letters and numbers. Inflight meals were entirely produced by the carrier and never subcontracted. Westwind had a way of doing business and the institutional culture that did not easily change or reflect the best practices of its competitors. The airline was a stock market darling amongst other airlines because it had the fastest recovery from 9/11 of any American based carrier. Although seen as a beacon of economic stability, the airline’s cash reserves after 9/11 and into the mid-2000s deteriorated. Despite this, the airline’s stock price remained stable and management remained content through this period. However, with the stock crash of 2008, the airline’s stock suffered a major crash. Shareholders clambered for change but management publicly announced that they would stay the course and avoid major operational changes. This was not a popular decision with stockholders who kicked off a revolving door of executives. Competitors smelled blood in the water and began making bids to takeover the ailing carrier and its valuable chunk of the West Coast and Pacific market. Valiant won that bid and announced that the last Westwind flight, WWA 254, would depart Kansas City for San Diego at 11:58 pm December 31, 2009. Westwind officially ceased to exist as the clock struck midnight and crowds cheered the beginning of a new decade two minutes later. The airline's branding lasted a few years longer but no aircraft made it past 2012 wearing Westwind colours.

This poster comes from 2005, during which Westwind took delivery of extended range 777 aircraft to inaugurate new routes. During this time, the airline also adopted a retro-esq style to its advertising. Due to the impending financial crunch, this style was effectively the last Westwind would ever deploy in a large scale advertisement campaign.

[Group B Star AS, ARS, Oswalt, San Antonio]

Star is an American low cost carrier founded in Texas in the 1970s by Richard Oswalt as Airmerican Star. Growing from a carrier seeking to undercut Texas giants on the highly popular short distance  San Antonio - Houston and Houston - Dallas routes. Until the Airline Deregulation Act of 1978, airlines could avoid the price fixing which forced major carriers to operate a certain standard of service by operating within the bounds of a single state (otherwise the act would have exceeded the Federal Government's authority under the Interstate Commerce Clause of the American Constitution, a fact the Supreme Court of the United States confirmed with its 7-2 ruling in Oswalt v Association of American Airlines for Market Stability). The airline thrived in its early days simply by providing slightly cheaper and more frequent service on its original two routes as well as routes to other Texas airports like El Paso and Austin. In 1978, when the Airline Deregulation Act passed, the airline was forced to innovate to survive an onslaught of true low cost competitors that operated on shoestring budgets. Richard Oswalt's original plan to deal with this new competition was to expand rapidly and establish the carrier as a trendy alternative to mainline airlines. Oswalt's plan was successful thanks to the well timed death of an elderly friend, not because of any particular business acumen. In the 90s, the airline began to transition away from Oswalt's business strategy of trying to make an inherently uncool airline trendy and instead competing with the low cost carriers just as they competed with each other - by cutting costs. After 9/11, the airline was sold by its holding group who chose to float a public offering. After the initial public offering, the airline began what would become an extremely long and painful process the rebrand the airline and finally shelve the cumbersome and unattractive Airmerican portion of its name. This came with the creation of a mascot, Happy the Star who would terrify children around the nation represent the brand to young customers as it transitioned into the family leisure travel market. The original rebrand went off with many hitches and the original vision of Happy was serious revised by a second design studio. Despite the brand chaos, the airline continued to grow into new markets and overhaul its fleet to move away from fuel thirsty T tailed jets in favor of slick A320 series aircraft. The airline solidified the presence of Happy by enlarging him and the emphasizing its new website FlyStar.com on a 2012 revision of the livery. The Coronavirus and modern times seemed prepared to push the airline to the brink of bankruptcy, but the carrier has survived to thrive into the new decade and introduce a dynamic update to Happy the Star and its brand identity generally. Click the album and browse my gallery posts for more detailed lore and to see the evolution of the carrier and their mascot

Album: Star

8 images

37 comments

The Star Credit Card, under the new Star branding, is quite slick. With its new card, Star also revealed the successful outcome of their talks with Unionpay to become the first Unionpay network card widely used in America. This deal was mostly down to Unionpay offering a better rate than their previous vendor, Discover.

Finally, I have attached a memo from the airline distributed around the time of the latest brand refresh known internally as the Juice Memo.

 

 

NADC 2 Results!

First off I would like to apoligize to all of you who entered for taking a long time to finish composing the results. There was a bit of a internal problem with the NADC judging this year but we will learn from our mistakes and hopefully be able to come back next year with a much more streamlined process for judging results. 

And of course would not be right to not say thank you too all of you who took time to design something for this competition Airplano21 and myself have a great deal of fun putting this together for you all every year and hope it can continue in similar fashion next spring!

With that out of the way here are the results of NADC 2, Congrats!

Written Results