Exclusive: Following a Rebrand, Indie Creative Agency This January Wins Lufthansa’s American AOR

Lufthansa Group, the global airline headquartered in Cologne, Germany, has awarded its North America creative business to Washington, D.C.-based indie agency This January. The agency will focus on strengthening the brand’s salience with U.S. and Canadian audiences.

The brand and agency declined to reveal the incumbent agency, or the other agencies it invited to the internally led pitch. However, Lufthansa also works with DDB Tribal Hamburg, based in Germany, on a retained basis. DDB confirmed it did not take part in a pitch and continues its work with the brand abroad.

Lufthansa and This January are building on three years of existing work, which the agency executed on a project basis. “[Lufthansa’s] partnership really pushes us,” This January partner and executive creative director Maggie Winters told Adweek.

Airlines, travel and traction with new clients

The Lufthansa win is one example of the agency’s recent growth and traction with large brands. It’s completed projects for other well-known brands like Nike and The Motley Fool.

Work on airlines is part of the founders’ careers within the industry. Winters and co-founder Zach Goodwin, years ago at another agency, worked on the Air Canada account together. More recently, This January expanded its airline relationships with a recent assignment for American Airlines.

The shop’s travel expertise goes further. It was agency of record for Destination DC highlighting the agency’s ability to encourage travel to an American destination before the travel brand took work in-house.

This January and Lufthansa’s relationship goes back to 2020. The companies partnered on a pop-up for Lufthansa brand Austrian Air, which wound up getting canceled when the pandemic shut down air travel. The following year, they executed a campaign called “Dear Tampa” for another Lufthansa subsidiary, Eurowings Discover, to increase awareness of the carrier’s new U.S. routes, targeting growing markets like Tampa, Salt Lake City and Southwest Florida.

Most recently, This January worked with the client on its 2022 “Generation Fly” social campaign. Soon thereafter, in late February this year, it received the brand’s RFP.

By early April, the team pitched Lufthansa via Zoom, and then in person the following week. Lufthansa awarded This January its business quickly after that.

“Even though we had worked together for years, we had never met physically—only over Zoom,” said Winters. “So it was nice to have that process of getting to know each other a little bit better before they made their final decision.”

They are now working to broaden U.S. consumers’ knowledge of the Lufthansa brand and of its subsidiaries. This year, the partners have a San Francisco campaign for the Swiss International Air Lines brand and a product innovation plan rolling out for Allegris, the airline’s ergonomic seating option.

“The Lufthansa Group is excited to bring the local touch back to the U.S. after many years without a regional creative agency. After extensive review, we picked this boutique agency to bring thought leadership and clarity to our needs in North America,” said Jeannine Ricci, media and marketing manager at Lufthansa Group, in a statement provided to Adweek.

Lufthansa was not available for additional comment on the announcement.

Rebranding after Jan. 6, 2021

This January recently underwent a name change, catalyzed by the riot at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. Winters and Goodwin, who is also a partner and executive creative director at the agency, founded the shop in January 2020. At the time they decided on the name January Third, which seemed fitting given the agency’s aspirational messaging.

“We didn’t yet know what was ahead of us,” said Goodwin of the pandemic, which would disrupt the global economy just three months later. The agency had big aspirations, though, and hoped its name would capture “the feeling at the beginning of the year, when you look out and there are 12 months of possibilities, you’re like, ‘This year, I can do anything,’” Goodwin added.

Launching the agency was the founders’ first joint entrepreneurial venture. Even before the pandemic, they understood they were taking a risk. The events of Jan. 6 were another unexpected event that wound up marring the young agency’s brand.

“It was sad for us that then a year and three days later, there was the weirdness at the Capitol. It was a horrific day. For a while, it never even occurred to us. … But then it seemed to become clear that the words ‘January 6th’ were going to be attached to that day,” Goodwin said.

Any connection to the Capitol riots felt unacceptable to the leaders, especially when they found themselves fielding questions from clients and prospects who unassumingly said things like, “Oh, good thing you didn’t name it for three days after,” she added.

Clients understood that there was no connection between the events on Jan. 6 and the agency, the founders admitted. Despite this, the leaders decided to workshop their agency’s brand the same way they would a client’s brand when navigating a similar brand safety concern.

“The fresh start feeling is hard to get when folks are thinking about a dark spot in our history,” said Winters. The rebrand, which the agency executed itself, launched in May and wrapped up just this month. Now that the agency is three years old, it’s gaining momentum. It recently released a video explainer of both its origin and the impetus for its name change.

“We wanted this also to be an introductory document to the rest of the client universe that we hoped might end up finding us as a result of this unusual brush with American history,” said Goodwin.