AirAsia earns high praise with its (RED) corporate social responsibility project

This post is sponsored by AirAsia.

“All things being equal. They are not.
AIDS is the leading cause of death amongst young women worldwide. Yet it is treatable.
Every two minutes, a teenager is infected with HIV. Yet it is preventable.
Today 500 babies will be born with HIV. Same thing tomorrow. And the next day.
AIDS no longer has to be a death sentence. One pill a day. For just 20 cents can stop mothers from passing on the virus to their babies. #EndAids.”

The manifesto above comes from one of AirAsia’s global partners, (RED), a not-for-profit organisation based in the US, fighting for AIDS and HIV prevention around the world.

Signing an agreement with the organisation at the end of 2018, AirAsia wanted to bring awareness to its message across the ASEAN region and develop products and activations to help raise and contribute funds to (RED) and the Global Fund.

Using AirAsia’s reach and platform as an opportunity to raise funds for the cause, the company has dedicated the past year to designing key programmes; ensuring that all money raised goes towards supporting HIV/AIDS testing, counselling, treatment and prevention programmes.

AirAsia’s year-long campaign included five potentially life-saving projects.

AirAsia (WEAREALLCHAMPIONS)^RED Livery

As part of the (RED) campaign launch, and to help build brand awareness of the partnership, AirAsia kick-started the campaign by painting the skies red through a unique (WEAREALLCHAMPIONS)^RED A320 livery. The aircraft livery travelled all over ASEAN, bringing brand awareness to the (RED) cause to millions across the region.

As one of the first tangible assets of the partnership, the A320 livery design was a creative collaboration between (RED) and AirAsia. A behind the scenes livery video was also shot and shared across AirAsia and (RED) social media channels, ensuring the reach of this message and the aircraft livery went beyond just those who saw it at airports.

Experience with RED

https://www.facebook.com/iamrichbrian/videos/722738174773795

Leveraging on another AirAsia global partnership – Experience with (RED) – we utilised the power of AirAsia, (RED) and Rich Brian, an Indonesian hip-hop artist signed with 88rising. Those involved each ran a competition to “win an all expenses paid trip to catch Rich Brian in Tokyo”, and for every “ticket” sold at US$10 per entry, AirAsia matched the ticket contribution with all donations going to the Global Fund.

This once in a lifetime opportunity was communicated to fans from all over the world and was supplemented with direct social shout-outs from Brian himself.

The AirAsia BIG Sale

AirAsia looked to adapt one of its existing sales into a donation programme, and did so through the well-known “AirAsia BIG sale”. For every flight booked on airasia.com and the AirAsia mobile app during a  24-hour sale period in November, AirAsia donated US 20 cents – enough to buy one day’s worth of live-saving antiretroviral treatment for someone living with HIV.

The sale relied heavily on PR and was announced during the initial livery launch. News outlets promoted this in print and digital channels, while AirAsia managed to sell more than 400,000 seats in this 24-hour period.

Merchandise

Known for its on-board merchandise, AirAsia also created an exclusive line of co-branded merchandise that was sold on board AirAsia flights. The merchandise, which was featured in the company’s in-flight magazine and sold via AirAsia’s eCommerce platform, ourshop.com, included key chains, caps, umbrellas and a special Airbus A320 aircraft complete with the (RED) livery.

In-flight food (Santan)

The final project of the year integrated one of AirAsia’s beloved products, its in-flight food brand Santan. Working with (RED) ambassador, New York-based Thai chef Hong Thaimee, AirAsia developed a new in-flight menu item – the INSPI(RED) Burger. The burger was influenced heavily by the chef’s northern Thai roots and 10% of sales from each burger sold on board were donated back to the global fight for HIV/AIDS.

Utilising (RED), AirAsia and chef Thaimee’s social channels, content was created and distributed in the form of key visuals as well as behind the scenes videos (for example, the process of meal development.) In addition to this, AirAsia developed a brand commercial featuring the new INSPI(RED) burger which was distributed on social channels, as well as in cinemas across Malaysia and Thailand.

AirAsia has had several corporate social responsibility projects running throughout the year with project (RED) being a standout in 2019. The (RED) project won gold at the recent Marketing Excellence Awards 2019 for Excellence in Corporate Social Responsibility.

For further information on how AirAsia helps to develop social commerce opportunities and assist ASEAN communities, you can also visit AirAsia Foundation, the company’s philanthropic arm.