Launching the first helicopter airline in Greece.
Behind the scenes: how we helped hoper reshape travel to the Greek islands.
In our latest collaboration, we joined forces with Demitris Memos, a visionary entrepreneur and the former CEO of MarineTraffic, to launch hoper—the first scheduled helicopter airline in Greece. This innovative service is set to dramatically shorten travel times to the Greek islands, enhancing accessibility and transforming regional transportation.
Why We Decided to Work with and Invest in hoper
TLDR: because of the significant impact it brings.
Greek hospitality has evolved impressively over the years, consistently delivering a five-star experience to travelers. However, one aspect remains unchanged: transportation. It's still time-consuming, complex, and fraught with hassle. But hoper aims to change this by democratizing helicopter rides and swift travel for a broader audience.
At the heart of our decision though, was our belief in the hoper team. Their collective experience, clear vision, and deep expertise convinced us that they were poised to drive a monumental shift in regional travel. Especially taking under consideration the fact that the future of eVTOLs (electric Vertical Takeoff and Landing aircraft) is closer than we think, redefining air travel globally in the coming years. And hoper places us at the forefront of this transformation, ensuring that Greece not only keeps pace with global developments but leads in adapting these innovations to enhance its unique geographical and cultural landscape.
BORRN played a key role in executing hoper’s vision, starting with two clear, primary objectives:
Making helicopter rides widely accessible: Shifting the perception of helicopter travel from an exclusive charter service to a practical, scheduled option.
Shaping a brand new travel experience: Crafting an entire travel ecosystem that's intuitive and welcoming, aiming to set a new standard for air travel in Greece. This involved not just creating a simple booking system but also reimagining every aspect of the journey, from initial engagement to the final destination.
Making Helicopter Rides Widely Accessible
In Greece, the concept of helicopter travel has traditionally been associated with exclusive charter services. To introduce hoper as a scheduled and accessible option, we needed to change this narrative fundamentally. It all started with crafting and shouting out a clear vision: “hoper reinvents how people connect to the Greek islands by making helicopter seats widely available”.
Building a Simple yet Friendly Brand
We crafted a brand that is approachable and relatable, steering clear of luxury connotations to appeal to a broader audience. Our branding strategy involved:
Inspiring Storytelling: We articulated a compelling narrative about hoper's mission to transform travel to the Greek islands. This story was consistently shared across various channels, reinforcing the message that hoper is here to make a significant, positive change. In every interaction, we highlight the unique, enjoyable aspects of traveling with hoper. The fact that the journey can be as extraordinary as the destination. Our messaging emphasizes the exceptional views and the overall experience of the journey itself, ensuring that every flight isn’t just a means to an end but a memorable part of the vacation.
Vibrant Colors and Playful Approach: We selected a color palette that bursts with vitality, designed to catch the eye and evoke a sense of excitement and accessibility. This visual strategy extends beyond digital interfaces to include all offline materials, creating a cohesive and engaging experience at every touchpoint.
Tone of Voice | Simple, Friendly, and Catchy: We developed a tone of voice that resonates with our brand's core values, making every communication effortlessly understandable and engaging. This tone helps us connect with our audience on a personal level, making technical aspects of helicopter travel relatable and easy to grasp.
Educating Users
To align helicopter travel with more conventional travel experiences and enhance its accessibility, we focused on educating users on the following:
Booking by the Seat: Introducing the option to book individual seats is a game-changer. This move aligned hoper more with traditional airline services and allowed us to price the experience in a way that is understandable and attractive to the average traveler.
Scheduled Services: We emphasised hoper’s flights regularity by adopting and highlighting a fixed schedule, much like mainstream airlines, making the service seem more dependable and routine.
These focused efforts combined to create a coherent and appealing brand image, simplify the user experience, and effectively communicate the benefits of our services, thereby transforming hoper into a mainstream travel option rather than a niche luxury.
Shaping a Brand New Travel Experience
Transforming helicopter island hopping into a simple and frequent pleasure comes with creating a brand new travel experience. As the first of its kind in Greece, we helped hoper on crafting a fun and seamless journey, almost from scratch. It's rare and exhilarating to work on such pioneering projects, and we are grateful that the team entrusted us with this inspiring endeavor.
We especially enjoyed the project because it allowed us to tackle multiple challenges simultaneously. From designing signs and branded materials for heliports, to creating stickers and postcards, preparing sales decks, and developing baggage solutions—managing these diverse elements as we launched a new service was a incredibly exciting for our team.
Together, we've reimagined many aspects of the travel experience, from the initial booking to the final touchdown, setting a new benchmark for air travel standards in Greece.
In-Depth Research
Our initial step was to thoroughly grasp the nuances that distinguish helicopter bookings from conventional travel options. We conducted a thorough review of everything from strict legal requirements to detailed user expectations. This not only ensured our system complied with all regulations but also aimed to make it user-friendly and intuitive.
To truly empathize with our users and tailor the booking experience to their needs, we developed an extensive user journey map. This process involved creating detailed user stories at each step, helping us anticipate potential issues and user needs before they became problems. By integrating these stories, we were able to visualize every interaction from the user's perspective — from initial interest to post-flight feedback. This approach proved essential in gearing up to address the array of challenges hoper encountered while building the travel experience, ensuring that our solutions were closely aligned with user expectations.
The most fun part of the research, though, was definitely the test flights. Getting to try them out ourselves? Absolutely fun and super enlightening around the experience we aimed to build! It was unbelievable how we could reach our first destination, Kea, in less than 15’ and then hop over to Andros in just 10’ more.
The Challenges hoper Faced in Building the Travel Experience
hoper faced several key challenges in elevating the travel experience for helicopter passengers. To address these, they implemented strategic solutions that seamlessly integrated with their service offerings:
Collaboration with Municipalities: Partnered with local governments to transform public heliports into welcoming, functional mini-terminals.
Baggage Solutions: Developed synergies for handling extra baggage, ensuring it's transported directly to passengers' accommodations.
Ground Transfer Coordination: Integrated partnerships with hotels and transport services for smooth ground transfers directly from heliports.
Streamlined Check-In and Safety Procedures: Refined boarding controls to enhance check-in efficiency and reinforce safety protocols throughout the passenger journey.
Building a User-Friendly Booking Mechanism to Accommodate These Needs
Collaborating closely with the hoper team, we developed a booking mechanism that seamlessly integrates many of the logistical solutions directly into the user interface:
Intuitive Design: The booking platform is designed to be clean and user-friendly, guiding passengers through each step of the booking process with ease. From selecting flights to finalizing travel details, the interface ensures a straightforward experience.
Integrated Baggage and Transfer Solutions: Right from the start, we established a simple yet effective way within the booking process for managing extra baggage and arranging ground transfers. This initial solution ensures all travel logistics are smoothly handled from air to ground, providing essential support while we actively work on enhancing these services for even greater convenience.
Flexible Fare Options: To accommodate different passenger needs, we simplified the fare structures, introducing flexible fare types. This approach allows passengers to choose options that best fit their travel plans without feeling overwhelmed by complexity.
Enhanced Safety Communications: We've incorporated detailed safety information directly into the booking flow and transactional emails. Clear guidelines about weight limits and boarding procedures are provided, ensuring passengers understand what is expected before they arrive at the heliport.
This collaborative effort resulted in a booking system that not only meets the logistical demands of helicopter travel but also enhances the overall customer experience, making it as stress-free and enjoyable as possible.
Building Trust
Trust is the cornerstone of any similar service. Our work had to reflect this in the best way possible:
Seamless Experience: Every step of the booking process was refined to minimize clicks and confusion.
Transparent Communication: We ensured that what passengers needed to know was communicated clearly, without jargon or ambiguity.
Dependable Support: Knowing help was just a call or click away made a big difference in reassuring users.
Through these efforts, we transformed the entire experience into something that didn’t just function smoothly—it felt personal and attentive. Each step was crafted to reassure users that they were making the right choice, ensuring their holidays started long before they took to the skies.
We are very happy that hoper's launch marks a new course for travel in Greece. It’s been a pleasure to work with the team on this. Here's to many more adventures above the Aegean!