TGV
Accelerating the experience
TGV is the high-speed train service of SNCF, the French national railroad operator. TGV was created in the early 80’s and developed through the expansion of the high-speed railways network into France and with connections abroad. It was first rebranded in 2000, with a new identity and a new positioning.
Challenges
Develop a new brand positioning for TGV, keeping in mind the framework of future European market openings, such as anticipated risk of direct competition with French railways.
Review and adjust the TGV brand architecture, in a context of existing multiple brands or separate brands created over time.
Actions
We first developed a new brand positioning for the TGV brand. For this, we:
- Conducted a complete brand assessment including communication audits and customer journeys in France and abroad
- Led a comprehensive quantitative consumer research on TGV and competitors in six European countries, to understand the TGV brand perception, identify the brand backbone as well as gaps and limitations
- Developed and discussed brand positioning scenarios, evaluated them and built the final brand positioning recommendation
- Refined the selected brand positioning into image attributes and key objectives and implications on the customer journey
- Built the high level brand activation plan in line with the brand strategy
- Took part in a renaming process born from the project, led a naming testing quantitative research and brought conclusions to top management
In addition, we made a complete review of the TGV brand architecture. For this, we:
- Identified the key dimensions to be treated in the brand architecture
- Based on those dimensions, we developed brand architecture scenarios
- Developed an evaluation grid to qualify the brand architecture alternatives
- Assessed the options and defined the recommended new brand architecture, including: the roles of each brand in the TGV brand strategy, the recommendation of brands’ removals, the recommended changes in names, and the guidance for visual and experiential consistency
These projects led to the launch of an internal program, structured around the steps and touchpoints in the TGV brand experience. This program is still running and progressively bringing results as new offers and services.