It’s out with EIA and in with YEG at the Edmonton International Airport.
The airport is getting rid of its old name EIA and rebranding to be referred to by its official international airport designation code, YEG.
“The Edmonton metro region has used YEG as an identifier for many years. It represents our community and we’re all part of that YEG region,” said Elizabeth Dwernychuk, director of corporate communications at YEG.
“While we’ve always been YEG’s airport, the time has come for us to officially adopt the code as part of our name.”
The airport adopted the brand EIA in 2007. Dwernychuk said now is the time to rebrand to YEG as the airport evolves from the COVID-19 pandemic. In addition, the airport is increasingly speaking to international audiences to attract new visitors, new flights, new cargo service and business investment.
“It’s the perfect time to start to think about how we rebuild in our community and as an airport. And we know we’ve had more international audiences than we’ve ever had before,” Dwernychuk said. “It also makes sense to evolve to a more internationally-recognizable name, which again is YEG.
“YEG is our IATA airport code. So we’ve always been YEG — people will see that on their baggage, all their luggage and their boarding passes… Evolving to YEG… It’s in alignment with other airports, such as YVR and YYC. It makes sense that we evolve to YEG as well.
“Many people call us YEG anyway so it just makes it more aligned both locally as well as internationally.”
The new branding at the airport started Monday, but Dwernychuk noted the full shift to the new name will take some time.
As a way to get the word out to the community, the airport launched a scavenger hunt on Monday.
The airport will post a clue on social media every day at noon from Monday to Thursday. It will direct people to find big YEG letters somewhere in the Edmonton region. Once they find the big letters, they’ve asked to take a selfie with them and post the picture on social media using the hashtag #YEGhunt.
The grand prize of the scavenger hunt is a trip for four people, including flights and accommodations up to a value of $10,000, to any non-stop destination out of YEG.
More information on the scavenger hunt can be found on YEG’s website.