Atrium as Showcase for Airbus Americas
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Airbus established an engineering center in the Air Capital in 2002, and in 2017 ramped up its presence by moving to a state-of-the-art building on Wichita State’s Innovation Campus. After living in the building for a while, management wanted to add some brand personality and Wichita enthusiasm into the look and feel of the atrium. They turned to us to convert its beautiful space into a showcase for visual storytelling.

Sonia Greteman, president and creative director of Greteman Group, stands with Airbus Americas Engineering Head of Operations Bill West at the atrium unveiling celebration.

Our assignment: make the lobby more welcoming, experiential and informative. Communicate the breadth of the global company, but focus on the Wichita campus. What brought Airbus to the Air Capital. Its role in the community. Its values-driven culture. The stories that set it apart.

Global Brand, Local Company

Audiences are both internal and external. The experience center serves to promote pride, confidence and advocacy on the part of Airbus team members. It also helps attract and recruit the highest-levels of engineering talent. It works to educate – and to stir emotional responses from its many outside groups: students, business leaders, legislators, airlines, global visitors and industry advocates. We want people to leave the experience center understanding that Airbus is an international company with a deep, multifaceted U.S. presence – and thinking: “Wow, what a tremendous team doing great things within the industry and community.”

Transformative, Forward-Looking Focus

Large-scale wall graphics, 3-D type and shadowboxes cover the walls. Photographs of Airbus team members add a human connection while big, bold quotes convey key messages. Engineering drawings complement shots of completed aircraft in flight.

A large monitor plays a looped, 7-minute video in which unscripted members of the Airbus team share thoughts about their work and Wichita. Footage of the Airbus Flying Challenge shows Airbus engineers helping high-school students build a kit airplane. (And, yes, at the end of the course it flies.) Supplemental corporate footage helps convey the scope of Airbus’s worldwide impact.

While we tell the history of Airbus in Wichita, the focus is the future. And it’s bright.