Some names are sticky. Some, you wish you never thought of them. And some are just grand, and deliver the essence of your dreams. Once upon a time, there was a little Airbus exploring a new world, a brave, new, Latin world. But a world filled with big, strong competitors, who already knew these wild hunting grounds, and would have no mercy in the battle to come. What about poor little A319?

Time was 1994, and place was the Chilean FIDAE aerospace show, in Santiago, Chile, a place renowned for being still in summer when every other airshow in the Northern hemisphere is chilling, and for being quite welcoming. This was the time for Airbus to probe a market which promised a quick growth, a market that looked like the right one. This was, obviously, the time for a good communication idea.

When brain storming is a standard condition, lightning strikes as a normal fallout. Soon it appeared obvious that brave little Airbus should have a name to match the grandeur of this Cordillera that it was bound to cross over and over again. Then the name popped up, just like that. It should be the name of the higher point of the continent. Two days later, with the concourse of Father Sebastian, the head chaplain of the Chilean Air Force, brave little A319 was soaring the blue Andes sky, proudly sporting the name “Aconcagua”. Since then, Airbus has never missed a FIDAE show, following the deep attraction that someday brought Aéropostale to Colina.

The rest of the story is far less private. In fact, a success like Airbus’s in Latin America is not a common occurrence. Eighteen years later, every Airbus model has been seen flying over the continent, from Avianca to LAN, from TAME to Aerolíneas Argentinas, from Conviasa to Surinam Airways, and all the new models have been adopted by the market, from the original A319, also in service as Corporate Jets for the Venezuelan and Brazilian governments, to the newest A350 of which Synergy Aerospace (Avianca and SAM in Columbia, OceanAir in Brazil, VIP in Ecuador) is acquiring ten -800s, and TAM, in Brazil, 27 more, while at the same time being the continental launching customer for the A320Neo.

Success has to be fed with more success. Soon the Airbus family was clocking record figures. Just two years after this baptism, it was selling 94 aircraft in the region, of which 90 covering a common order passed by LAN, TAM and TACA. In 2011, Airbus improved its performance with 100 aircraft sold, grabbing 91% of the total orders for aircraft over 100 seats, including the biggest order ever in the history of Mexican aviation (Volaris), of which 30 A320neos. In other terms, US$ 9,500 million…and new records are still to come, as the region keeps being one of the best promises around.

According to Airbus Global Market Forecast, Latin America will require over 2,000 new aircraft over 100 seats before 2030, of which 701 for Brazil, 412 for Mexico and 135 for Colombia, in order to cover an exceptional 6.6% traffic growth rate, and a regional traffic expected to triple over the next twenty years, enough for a good many more records, fuelled by a GDP that should improve by 144% over the same period.

So, what’s in a name? Probably the amount of efforts and expectations that you put in it. But nobody can say that the name bestowed on poor little A319 in 1996 did not live up to everybody’s expectations, bringing Airbus on the top of Latin American aviation world. Up and counting…