Being a German based company, it’s completely understandable that a number of Aviationtag’s releases have - in one way or another, come from former Lufthansa aircraft.
Personally this isn’t a huge problem for me. I adore Lufthansa. I adore Germany in general. However it’s national airline is something I feel German’s should be incredibly proud of. I really enjoyed their service when I flew with them to Munich and back a few years ago.
Lufthansa operate a mainly Airbus fleet (again, not a huge problem for me) but do still fly examples of the B747-8i and are the launch customer for the Boeing 777-9X. They’re current going through a process of fleet retirement and renewal, with aircraft such as the A340-600 being phased out and A350-900s brought in to replacement. The narrow body fleet is also going through changes, with A320 CEOs being changed for A320 NEOs.
We mention these aircraft specifically because they have featured as tag releases, primarily through the Lufthansa Worldshop - we’ll come to that shortly.
The first standard release came in the form of the super rare Boeing 747-400, D-ABVC. Research suggests this was in fact Aviationtag’s first ever release, and was available in a multitude of colours. This combination is probably why they’re so valuable.
The other release was Airbus A340-600, D-AIHR. D-AIHR came in dark blue, white and bicolour. It does however feature an incorrect engraving. The A340-600 carries Rolls-Royce Trent 500 engines, but the engraving on the tag is that of a CFM56, carried by the -200/-300 variant. As a result of this, it’s not been as popular with collectors, however holds it value in a weird way because of this error.
Owing to the partnership between Lufthansa and Aviationtag, there have been 3 releases exclusive to the Lufthansa Worldshop. The tags are also sold onboard Lufthansa aircraft. The Worldshop exclusives come in commemorative packaging, an extra cardboard presentation wallet.
Initially the only aircraft available was A340-600 D-AIHO. 20,000 tags were cut from the aircraft, and came in grey, white and dark blue. I bought them direct through the Worldshop, and was pleased to have my first full set of colours in my collection.
The second and third releases both came from Airbus A320s. D-AIPA (MSN 69) available in bicolour, dark blue and white, and D-AIPC (MSN 71) available in white and “coloured” - primarily black. The black tags come from the fact Papa Charlie was a Star Alliance liveried aircraft. There are a very small amount of full blue tags available cut from AIPC, the quantity is much smaller compared to AIPA, as there is considerably less blue used, as it carries a much smaller Lufthansa logo
I am lucky enough to own all the whole colour tags from both AIPA and AIPC, which majorly boosted my A320 family collection. If you’re considering purchasing any of the Lufthansa tags, I can thoroughly recommend them. The tags are fully licensed so feature Lufthansa branding, which is an extremely nice touch. I’m eagerly looking forward to seeing what other Lufthansa tags are released in the future. I think it would be very naive of anybody to think that Aviationtag won’t ever do another Lufthansa tag.
