How does a 100-year-old legacy airline stay innovative? And how do we create compelling work to show Delta’s more than just an airline?
In 2021, we were sent a dream brief by Delta when Issa Rae expressed interest in partnering together. In considering Issa’s entrepreneurship, fashion sense and commitment to elevating small businesses, we came up with The Delta Runway Runway Collection: a fashion line for travelers, by travelers. We facilitated the opportunity for two icons to build a strategic partnership and elevate 6 small businesses by creating a limited-edition collection of travel-savvy items.
Our goals: champion the benefits of business and travel, solidify Delta as a badge brand with cultural cache, and make an unexpected splash digitally and IRL. We led with personal stories: sit-down interviews with each small biz designer in a Q&A conducted by Issa Rae, roughly 30 assets, and 130 social posts. The content resulted in 2.1M organic views and 160K organic engagements on social posts. The collection also needed to speak to Delta’s DNA, so we worked with our designers to marry business travel and leisure; the results consisted of versatile ready-to-wear staples and a selection of accessories designed for the chic and well-traveled. We housed the interviews and teased the collection by building a microsite where curious consumers could engage with our content and racked up ~2.4M microsite impressions.
Before the products were announced, we were written up in a variety of publications that spanned travel, fashion-lifestyle, and prominent trades, with a reach of over 580.5MM impressions. And the official debut dropped at an invite-only live-streamed event during LAFW. Our diverse, inclusive fashion show took place in a stunningly transformed airplane hangar that seated 200 guests, a mix of influencers who helped us extend reach and build credibility alongside other fashion-forward individuals — and we broadcasted it all from Delta’s IG Live.
Together we demonstrated the cultural power of strategic partnerships and further proved that Delta Air Lines is not just an airline.
