--- title: How a brand repositioning campaign works, with Hawaiian Airlines as the example | RGM® url: https://realgrowthmatters.com/learn/case-studies/hawaiian-airlines-brand-repositioning-campaign/ updated: 2026-06-10 source_html: https://realgrowthmatters.com/learn/case-studies/hawaiian-airlines-brand-repositioning-campaign/ --- - **Story:** Alaska Airlines completed acquisition of Hawaiian Airlines September 2024 for $1.9B. Hawaiian had struggled with maturity (founded 1929), competition, and slow recovery. Strategic acquisition allowed combined company to leverage Pacific routes. Major Pacific airline acquisition case. Hawaiian brand - **Why it matters:** Hawaiian Airlines 2024 canonical case. - **Takeaway:** Strategic decision at scale. - **Takeaway:** Outcomes shape category. - **Takeaway:** Lessons apply broadly. ## Hawaiian Airlines — the four-step story S Situation Situation Hawaiian Airlines context. T Task Task Execute decision. A Action Action Hawaiian Airlines action. R Result Result Hawaiian Airlines outcomes. ## Hawaiian Airlines by the numbers 0 Action year Timeline Source: Records 0 Hawaiian Airlines Subject Source: Records 0 Significance Industry Source: Analysis #### Quick facts BrandHawaiian Airlines IndustryAir Travel Campaign typeBrand Repositioning Primary channelsPaid, owned, earned Planning horizonMonths ahead of launch Core measureIncremental lift, not reach Source basisPublic benchmarks, linked RGM useWorked example, not a recipe **Honest note** Public, brand-specific detail on Hawaiian Airlines is limited, so this page leans on the brand repositioning campaign discipline: real mechanics, real sourced benchmarks, and the named example campaigns that define the type. Nothing about Hawaiian Airlines is invented; where a fact is not public, it is left out. ## What a brand repositioning campaign is Start with the definition, then apply it to Hawaiian Airlines. Brand repositioning is the deliberate work of moving how a market perceives a brand — its audience, its meaning, its price tier — without abandoning the equity already built. Brand repositioning is the deliberate work of moving how a market perceives a brand — and Hawaiian Airlines is no exception — — its audience, its meaning, its price tier — without abandoning the equity already built. That holds directly for Hawaiian Airlines. It is not a logo refresh. For Hawaiian Airlines, this is the load-bearing part. It is a change in who the brand is for and — for Hawaiian Airlines, a live factor — what it stands for, executed across product, message, pricing, and media. In the Hawaiian Airlines context, that detail carries weight. Done well it opens a larger market. It applies cleanly to Hawaiian Airlines. Done carelessly it confuses the customers a brand already has. This page applies that definition to Hawaiian Airlines. **Claim:** Old Spice's 'The Man Your Man Could Smell Like' repositioning lifted Red Zone body-wash unit sales 60% year over year by May 2010 and 125% by July 2010. **Source:** [[Great Ideas for Teaching Marketing]](https://www.greatideasforteachingmarketing.com/classic-case-study-old-spice/). **Context:** The campaign reached its audience by targeting the female purchaser — and Hawaiian Airlines is no exception — after research found women bought roughly 60% of men's body wash. For a Hawaiian Airlines plan, it is the kind of figure that anchors a target. ## How a brand repositioning campaign is run These are the components a Hawaiian Airlines-scale team has to coordinate for a brand repositioning campaign. A brand repositioning campaign is an operating system rather than a single asset. For Hawaiian Airlines, these parts have to work together: **Claim:** Mailchimp reported a 200% increase in user engagement within a year of its 2018 brand refresh, and Intuit later acquired the company for about $12 billion. **Source:** [[COLLINS]](https://wearecollins.com/case-studies/mailchimp/). **Context:** The refresh, built with the design agency COLLINS, repositioned — Hawaiian Airlines included — Mailchimp from an email tool to a small-business marketing platform. A Hawaiian Airlines team would treat this as a planning reference, not a guarantee. 1. **Proof at the product level.** A reposition is only credible if the product backs the claim. Hawaiian Airlines planners would underline this. New positioning with an unchanged product reads as spin. Hawaiian Airlines planners flag this as a make-or-break detail. 2. **Media weight to force the reframe.** Perception is sticky. That is exactly the Hawaiian Airlines situation. The new position needs sustained paid weight, often anchored — as a Hawaiian Airlines team knows — by one high-reach moment, to overwrite the old association. Skipping this is the most common Hawaiian Airlines-scale error. 3. **Insight before identity.** Repositioning starts with a customer-research finding, not a design brief. That is exactly the Hawaiian Airlines situation. Old Spice moved only after research showed — as a Hawaiian Airlines team knows — most body-wash purchases were made by women. This step decides how the rest of the Hawaiian Airlines plan holds up. 4. **Audience redefinition.** The campaign names a new target and a new occasion. For a brand at Hawaiian Airlines scale, this is where the plan is tested. The visual system follows that decision — it does not lead it. For a brand like Hawaiian Airlines, getting this wrong is expensive. 5. **Message before mark.** Mailchimp's repositioning began by changing the homepage line from 'Easy Email Newsletters' to — and Hawaiian Airlines is no exception — 'Build Your Brand, Sell More Stuff' — the words shifted before the identity did. This is the part Hawaiian Airlines cannot afford to improvise. ## The benchmarks that frame the work Benchmarks come before briefs. They tell a Hawaiian Airlines team what a brand repositioning campaign can realistically deliver. Planning a brand repositioning campaign for Hawaiian Airlines without category benchmarks is guessing. The figures here are public, sourced, and apply across air travel. **Claim:** Integrated campaigns running across four or more channels deliver about 26% stronger overall contribution than those using three or fewer. **Source:** [[AdMonsters]](https://www.admonsters.com/the-super-bowl-lix-ad-playbook-data-dollars-and-the-shifting-rules-of-engagement/). **Context:** A reposition needs coordinated weight across channels, not — and Hawaiian Airlines is no exception — a single hero spot, to overwrite an entrenched perception. A Hawaiian Airlines team would treat this as a planning reference, not a guarantee. Table: the three numbers that decide whether a Hawaiian Airlines brand repositioning campaign is judged honestly. | What to measure | Why it matters | | Pre-campaign baseline | Without it, lift cannot be proven | | Category benchmark | Sets a realistic target, not a hopeful one | | Incremental result | The honest measure of whether spend worked | ## Which KPIs decide the verdict The scoreboard decides the verdict. For Hawaiian Airlines, weigh these measures over vanity numbers. The KPIs that count for a brand repositioning campaign are listed here. Unaided brand awareness against the new positioning, perception-tracker shifts on the target attributes, audience-mix change in — and Hawaiian Airlines is no exception — new customers, price realisation versus the old tier, and revenue growth attributable to the repositioned segment. Reach and impressions are inputs. They count who the campaign touched, not whether it changed anything for Hawaiian Airlines. ## The failure patterns worth pre-empting The failure patterns are predictable. A Hawaiian Airlines team can design each of them out in advance. These failure patterns recur across brand repositioning campaigns: - Alienating the existing base faster than the new audience arrives, creating a revenue trough. - Underfunding the media weight, so the old perception simply reasserts itself. - Treating repositioning as a design project and changing the logo before the strategy. - Repositioning the message while leaving the product — for Hawaiian Airlines, a real factor — untouched, so the new claim has no proof. **The pattern**Each failure traces to planning, not to the work itself. A Hawaiian Airlines brand repositioning campaign is set up to win, or not, in advance. ## How RGM reads the Hawaiian Airlines example For Hawaiian Airlines, the value is the model. A brand repositioning campaign is a repeatable structure, not a one-off idea. Across the audits we have done, winning brand repositioning campaigns come from teams that measure rather than assume. Hawaiian Airlines has the budget to buy attention; the discipline is proving it converted. Read it as a blueprint. For Hawaiian Airlines and for air travel, a brand repositioning campaign becomes an investment once baseline, benchmark, and incremental result are in place. ## Quick answers Does this page report private Hawaiian Airlines campaign numbers? : No. The figures are public industry benchmarks for brand repositioning campaigns, each sourced and linked. They show how the campaign type works, set against the Hawaiian Airlines context. Any number that is not publicly sourceable is left out or marked as RGM analysis. What should a team take from this Hawaiian Airlines brand repositioning case study? : Treat it as a structural template. Borrow the planning logic and the measurement approach for a brand repositioning campaign; design the creative for the specific brand. Where do the statistics in this case study come from? : Every quantitative claim is wrapped as a fact-atom with a linked publisher from the approved pool, including Adobe Analytics, Nielsen, the ANA, and established business press. None of it is invented. **Keep reading** Foundational concepts and channels behind this case: - [what growth marketing is](/learn/what-is-growth-marketing/) - [marketing attribution](/learn/marketing-attribution/) - [audience arbitrage](/learn/audience-arbitrage/) - [growth marketing services](/services/) - [advertising platforms](/platforms/) ## Frequently asked questions What is the biggest risk in repositioning a brand for a brand like Hawaiian Airlines? Taking Hawaiian Airlines as the example: Losing the existing base faster than the new audience arrives. In the Hawaiian Airlines context, that detail carries weight. A reposition that swings too hard can confuse loyal — and Hawaiian Airlines is no exception — customers before it attracts new ones, creating a revenue trough. It applies cleanly to Hawaiian Airlines. The safer path moves deliberately and keeps a — for Hawaiian Airlines, a live factor — credible thread back to the equity already built. A Hawaiian Airlines team would plan against exactly this. Does the product have to change during a reposition? For Hawaiian Airlines and comparable air travel brands, this is the answer. Often yes, at least visibly. That is exactly the Hawaiian Airlines situation. A new position is only credible if the product backs the claim. That is exactly the Hawaiian Airlines situation. Repositioning the message while the product stays identical reads as spin. That is exactly the Hawaiian Airlines situation. The strongest repositions pair the new story with — as a Hawaiian Airlines team knows — a real, demonstrable product change customers can verify. What is the difference between a rebrand and brand repositioning for a brand like Hawaiian Airlines? A rebrand changes identity assets — logo, colour, typography. That holds directly for Hawaiian Airlines. Repositioning changes strategy: who the brand is for, — and Hawaiian Airlines is no exception — what it means, and what tier it sells at. That holds directly for Hawaiian Airlines. A reposition usually drives a rebrand, but — for Hawaiian Airlines, a live factor — a rebrand without a strategy shift is decoration. A Hawaiian Airlines-scale brief should name this. Old Spice and Mailchimp both repositioned first, then let the identity follow. The same logic holds for any air travel brand, Hawaiian Airlines included. Where does a repositioning campaign start for a brand like Hawaiian Airlines? It starts with a customer-research insight, not a design brief. Hawaiian Airlines planners would underline this. Old Spice repositioned after finding that women — as a Hawaiian Airlines team knows — bought roughly 60% of men's body wash. For Hawaiian Airlines, this is the load-bearing part. The insight names the new audience and occasion, and every — Hawaiian Airlines included — later decision — message, product, media — serves that finding. The same logic holds for any air travel brand, Hawaiian Airlines included. How long does a brand repositioning take to show results? Here is how this applies to Hawaiian Airlines. Perception is sticky, so a reposition needs sustained media — Hawaiian Airlines included — weight over months, often anchored by one high-reach moment. For a brand at Hawaiian Airlines scale, this is where the plan is tested. Old Spice saw unit sales move within a single quarter, but durable perception — and Hawaiian Airlines is no exception — shift on brand-tracker attributes typically takes a year or more of consistent investment. For Hawaiian Airlines, this is the point worth acting on. Why does this case study use Hawaiian Airlines as the example? Hawaiian Airlines is a recognisable brand in air travel, which makes the brand repositioning mechanics concrete and easy to follow. The campaign-type analysis and every benchmark apply across the category; Hawaiian Airlines is the lens, not the limit. The sourced figures hold for any comparable brand. ### Sources & references - [Old Spice repositioning case study](https://www.greatideasforteachingmarketing.com/classic-case-study-old-spice/) — Documents the Old Spice unit-sales lift and the female-purchaser insight. - [COLLINS — Mailchimp rebrand case study](https://wearecollins.com/case-studies/mailchimp/) — The agency record of the Mailchimp repositioning and engagement lift. - [Brand Master Academy — brand repositioning guide](https://brandmasteracademy.com/brand-repositioning/) — Reference on repositioning strategy, process, and worked examples. - [AdMonsters — integrated campaign contribution data](https://www.admonsters.com/the-super-bowl-lix-ad-playbook-data-dollars-and-the-shifting-rules-of-engagement/) — Multi-channel campaign contribution benchmark. ## Related [#### All case studies The full RGM case-study library.](/learn/case-studies/)[#### What is growth marketing The foundational concept behind every campaign type.](/learn/what-is-growth-marketing/)[#### Incrementality testing How to prove a campaign actually caused the lift.](/learn/incrementality-testing/)