February 2009 Archives

How much? President Obama gave us a few hints about his aviation thinking with a budget outline, one that fell far short of the details a budget often has. That's understandable, since it's his first, but Obama tantalises. And promises. He does say he would increase funding for Essential Air Service, the subsidy that keeps rural flights operating, with a proposed $55 million increase over the 2009 level, intended to meet increasing demand. Last year's Bush budget had trimmed EAS to $50 million, although appropriators rejected the administration position and added about $75 million. This may help the new president avoid what had become an annual legislative charade: slashing or zeroing out EAS, then waiting for Congress, in particular the appropriations committees with their rural state members, to restore funding. The problem with this no-no, yes-yes approach is not just its inherent chicanery, but the fact that legislators, working from a base of zero, feel pressured to control their largess.

This is not the kind of Tweet you want. Pretty much every airline, major and minor, uses Twitter, the short-message, mini- microblogging sort of email service. They 'tweet' when they have sales or when there's a tie up at an airport; they also listen when they're Tweeted, good or (usually) bad. But there's a new type of Twitter that really disproves the marketer's old myth that it doesn't matter what they say so long as they get the name right, and that's disaster Tweets.
When a Turkish Airlines Boeing landed short and broke apart at Amsterdam's Schipol, the first word to the public was a Tweet, sent out by a fellow who lives near the airport. "Looking at a crashed aeroplane near Schipol," he wrote within minutes of the Flight 1951's impact - which killed at least nine people. His postings, at 140 characters, maximum, were running ahead of the Internet, and Twitter was soon outpacing even that fast-paced electronic communications system once known as the web.

Travelport, Tantalizing. Travelport is planning something called a universal desktop, which if it lives up to its promises will offer almost everything they need to travel agencies in one nice little box. Gordon Wilson, the Brit to the right who heads up Travelport's GDS, the former Galileo, spent a little time telling Left Field about this new tool, which will be able to wrap into one 'box' access to all of the Global Distribution Systems, including rivals Sabre and Amadeus. This is something of a holy grail for agents, both retail 'Main Street' types and more importantly the corporate agencies. Agents often become tied to one or another GDS through its desktop presence in their offices. But one screen to search means faster ways to find deals, comparison shop, and keep the client content, if not happy. 

So is this clever or what? We're not sure if JetBlue is trying to appeal to the folks these ads are seemingly addressed to or to every else and their resentments but we think the resentments will win. Labelled as an appeal to "bigwigs, muckety-mucks, private-jetters...," the new advertising campaign by the trendy carrier appeals directly to our hatred of the former fat cats and the (and we quote) "$5,300 an hour you used to pay for your private jet. Now in exchange for these shareholder-friendly prices, you'll have to share the plane with strangers," it says, touting JetBlue's fares and "unlimited free snacks." The carrier concludes with an interesting definition of air travel: "Just think of it as jet-pooling, only we find the other people for you."

 

'Nah, it's a really good idea. We just don't want to do it anymore.' That seems to be the thinking at US Airways, where chief executive Doug Parker's pulled a 180 and reversed its policy of charging its coach flyers for a soft drink, a coffee or a bottle of water. The airline began the policy last summer as most carriers jumped on the unbundling bandwagon and began charging for pretty much everything that they could. Now though, US Airways has gone back to free water. Explains Parker, "we are firmly committed to the a la carte model. But it is also a work in progress - US Airways has was the only large network carrier to charge for drinks and that put us at a disadvantage."

Is this new base a destination or an origin? When Allegiant finally got around to announcing its service in and out of LAX the other day, it made big news in a lot of small towns. In LaLa Land, not so much. But Medford, OR, Monterey, Calif., Wichita, Kan.; Springfield, Mo.; Sioux Falls, SD; Missoula, Mont.; McAllen, Texas; and Bellingham., WA, all celebrated. So did Billings, Mont.; Des Moines, Iowa; Fargo, ND; and Grand Junction, Colo. But after looking at the way Allegiant is growing and profiting, we wouldn't be too sure that the traffic will be entirely composed of folks from Fargo flocking to the southern California gateway.

 

They say that that Southwest has run out of low-hanging fruit, out of secondary airports like Oakland, Cal., or Long Island, NY's MacArthur, and that's why it's going into real big airports where they have lots of old-fashioned airlines, airports like Minneapolis/St. Paul, where it starts flights in March.

True, but only up to a point. Consider the LUVline's plan to enter Boston's Logan later this year. It hasn't chosen an exact date and it hasn't named routes yet, but Southwest is entering a very different Logan than the one it shunned back in the 1990s when it began flights to Providence, RI, (1996) and Manchester, NH, (1998), straddling Boston with two secondary airports offering easier ground access. But since then, Boston is has changed. Not only is the airport easier (or least less difficult) to get to with the finally final completion of the city's 'Big Dig' road project.

We always thought slots at airports meant landing and takeoff rights, but there's a guy in Maryland with a different idea. The State is moving to allow slot machines, the so-called one-armed bandits, at several spots, including race tracks and possibly a shopping mall. Now one guy, a state delegate named Eric Bromwell wants to put the machines in the state-owned BWI airport. He wants to put 3,000 slot machines behind the security gates so that people who are just waiting around for their flights will have something to do other than buy $7 hamburgers or browse at yet another leather-goods store. The governor says he's skeptical, but Bromwell told a local television station that his is a good idea because the slots would be in high-security area. We don't follow that. Incidentally, his bill is number H. Bill 777, but he says that's just coincidental. Will it fly?

A hit TV show in here the States is called 'Are you Smarter than a Fifth Grader?' It features grown-ups and panel of kids in the fifth grade; the host then sees who scores better on a general-knowledge quiz. We've watched this show and can proudly report that the answer is, usually we're not. Now comes another quiz that we know we can't do well on, 'Are you Smarter than a Schedule Planner?'

It is NOT a golf tournament, this Masters. Yes, it's exclusive and by invitation only, but it does not involve sticks, holes or little balls. No, this Masters Program, unlike the famed Masters Tournament of golf, is a pretty high-level gathering of the people who spend the most money every year on corporate travel. The gathering brings them face-to-face with the people they spend their money on, from airlines and hotels to car-rental companies to the companies that supply services like expense-reporting, expense-reporting auditing and expense-reporting policing. It's in Washington next week, and Left Field will be going. Even though it's behind closed doors, Left Field will report back to you what he hears.

Sweetening the pot: So after Delta cut most of the fares at its Cincinnati hub, it waited a few days and then let the other shoe drop. The carrier is now offering a frequent-flyer points bonus for people who fly from CVG to 15 business-type destinations, from Charlotte to Phoenix to Reagan Washington National. (Yes, Atlanta Hartsfield-Jackson is included.) Flyers who want to get the bonus points have to register and must fly by May 12; they will get 3,000 miles for their first roundtrip flight, moving steadily up the ladder to 10,000 miles for a fifth roundtrip flight.  In the Delta SkyMiles program, it takes 25,000 miles to qualify for a 'free' domestic roundtrip award.

We were saying the other day that it's too easy to underestimate the folks at Southwest. They're almost always doing something new. Take the other day when they began offering a (free) test of the Wi-Fi onboard Internet, complete with a special home page designed for them by Yahoo! That's neat and interesting.   Then they came  out with something else altogether: Southwest signed a deal with Sports Illustrated to paint the weekly mag's swimsuit issue 'cover girl' as a wrap-around on one of its planes. The reaction has been chemical, with a lot of really negative comments on the blog Nuts about Southwest. 
But the model also got a lot of attention, including an appearance on late night chat show host David Letterman's television show. Letterman introduced her as gracing the exterior of "a Southwest 757," which is interesting. (At right is the model, a fully clad woman named Bar Refaeli, holding the mag and standing in front of the Southwest jet, which will carry her image for a few weeks.)

   

Herewith, for no reason, none whatsoever, other than perhaps whimsy, is a picture that we liked very much. We hope you are as eager for your next trip as this faithful furry one, but we hope that you'll have a little more room in your cage.

Your flight on American may or may not be memorable, but the airline says it will remember you. The airline says that AAdvantage members, that is flyers enrolled in its loyalty program, who call for flight information will get it faster through new technology. The new 'Remember Me' feature will recognize phone numbers and greet customers by name as long as they're signed up for AAdvantage. Members can list up to three phone numbers from which they'll call the airline.
If the customer is booked on a flight that day, the system will offer gate and flight data without having to be asked, and will do it within 25 seconds, the airline said. (Above is a Forget-Me-Not in bloom.)

Yakadak: Left Field was on National Public Radio's Morning Edition this week. In a far-reaching interview (that means we basically were all over the map), long-time NPR hand Linda Wertheimer touched on a lot of issues; then NPR people you haven't heard of  proceeded to edit it into some sense.  The fruits of their efforts are here:. Incidentally, Delta's blog, Under the Wing, picked up on this broadcast, but alas, also thanked Left Field. We have written to the folks in Atlanta, asking them to stop trying to ruin our reputation as a fearless scribbler.

 

 

It's sort of the like the Cold War, the way people estimate the threat. For years we've heard that videoconferences will put the airlines out of business, that the threat is real and overwhelming. It's sort of like the scene in the classic film Doctor Strangelove (left) where the 'godless, atheistic commies' not only have more missiles than we do but they even have more mine shafts to hide in than we do. "A shaft gap!" exclaims the bad doctor.
Well, they're not atheistic or even godless, but videoconferencing or 'video-telepresence technologies' have come a long way. Now a Gartner Inc. analyst, Steve Prentice, sees this alternative to flying as a real threat. It will grow enough over the next three years that "high-definition video-meeting solutions" will cost the world's airlines some 2.1 million seats a year by 2012. This new, improved, bigger, better and cleaner technology will cost the travel and hospitality industry about $3.5 billion annually, Prentice predicts.

 

It really isn't that far from Cincinnati to places like Dayton or Louisville, especially if you're hungry for a low fare. Lots of people make the 90-mile drive to Louisville to catch a Southwest flight or schlep the 50 miles to Dayton to fly on AirTran. But back in Cinnci, Delta suffers the leakage. Now, Delta's moving to stimulate traffic at its Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky hub with a new fare structure that cuts prices paid by about 80% of the passengers. Delta chief executive Richard Anderson hinted at the fares in the SkyTeam carrier's recent earnings call, and the worlds of southern Ohio, where the city is, and northern Kentucky, where the airport is, has been waiting eagerly since.

Sometimes it's easy to forget Southwest. This would be a mistake. The LUV guys are always up to something, and they usually have a fresh take on it. Take food. No, they aren't serving food on board Southwest, just snacks, but they're showing some creativity about it. They've taken their snack list out of the back of the in-flight magazine and made it into a separate menu card that sits in the seatback. It's a clever offering and every category seems to begin with 'S.' You won't find any filet mignon or even any chips for sale, because Southwest makes a point not to charge for its simple eats. You won't find prices next to the LUV line's booze offerings, but you gotta pay. For free hooch, you gotta sit up front. And Southwest doesn't have a front. Of course, if you pay for a Business Select fare, you do get a free drink or at least one that's included in your fare.

One serious note: as on many other US carriers, Southwest's cabin is cashless. So you can pay two ways: credit cards or the little drinks coupons that the airline has.

There's no stopping these guys. Porter Airlines, after struggling for years against anti-noise neighbors and 'entrenched competitors,' is growing and now says that it may well order more Bombardier Q400 turboprops. Its founder and chief executive, Robert Deluce, says that "probably I shouldn't say this because there are Bombardier people here today, but we may be placing an order for more. Some discussions will have to take place first."
Deluce tells the Raymond James Growth Airline conference that the privately held carrier has two options remaining in its original order for 10 firm and 10 options, "and they will soon be spoken for." He praised the turboprop's operating efficiencies, saying that its 30%-40% fuel advantage over jets enabled Porter "to avoid costly fuel hedges." Deluce just told Airline Business that the carrier plans growth in both domestic and transborder routes this year.

Left Field's very first guest blogger just got off the phone with Dave Cush, the head of Virgin America. The startup was just forced to release financial data it wanted to keep secret, but our guest, Air Transport Intelligence US Editor Lori Ranson, was able to get Cush to open up in an entry she calls 'Burlingame Confidential.' That's the San Francisco suburb where Virgin is based.

 

Virgin America CEO Dave Cush says he is not deterred; he'll continue his fight to keep the carrier's operating data confidential even as it was forced to release data showing a $175 million loss for three quarters of 2008.  Virgin America began its campaign to keep its operating data confidential after suffering a $35 million loss for the quarter ending in September. But Cush believes that it was disruptive to both suppliers and employees for that info to reach public hands, he said  last year. He might have added Virgin's competitors, including American, United, Southwest and JetBlue - who no doubt are now pouring over Virgin America's operational data. A quick snapshot of the data released by the US government shows Virgin America had $25 million on cash at the end of September and roughly $105 million in assets. Top performing markets in terms of total passengers for January-October 2008 were Los Angeles at 34.9 million and Las Vegas at 33.8 million. Total passenger count in Seattle, which was only launched last year, reached 24.5 million - ahead of the 23.5 million in its home base in San Francisco.

 

 

Perhaps this is an example of the expenditure of vast amounts of ingenuity and energy in pursuit of minimal returns, but an on-line travel service that calls itself Yapta has begun offering its patrons instant, nay instantaneous, notification of changes in airfares. From there, Seattle-based Yapta can usually get customers a refund, it says. Yapta, which stands for Your Amazing Personal Travel Assistant, is slightly different than other on-line shopping services: it uses only the airlines' own websites, rather than any third-party search or aggregation site. More importantly, by tagging or linking to a specific fare for a specific routing, it tracks changes closely.

Were they very shy or what? Late last week, someone, most likely a very unhappy Southwest employee, put up a blog called 'Code Share Curse,' denouncing the Love Field-based carrier's plans for new international code sharing with Volaris of Mexico and WestJet of Canada. It was not a particularly attractive or persuasive blog, filled with grammatical and syntactical fuzziness and with sweeping statements such as 'history is littered with examples of code-shares that didn't work and destroyed carriers,' blabla.

For the longest time, Continental Airlines has suffered in the chase for real high flyers across the Atlantic, where it fleet is slanted toward 757s- with just 16 premium or Business First seats (and the rest in coach). With 55 inches of pitch, these seats up front are certainly quite nice, but they are not the kind of exclusive territory that people (or their employers) will pay thousands of extra dollars or euros for. Suddenly, though, this is a good thing. As Continental's president, Jeff Smisek, said during an earnings call late last week, "Many international business travellers appear to have shifted their flying from the front to the back. That said, the relative strength in the back isn't overcoming the weakness in the front..."