In a bid to return to its roots as it regroups, United Airlines is refocusing on its Chicago O'Hare home base while maintaining its less healthy but equally long tradition of drawn-out labour strife.
As it seeks union agreement to a new round of cost cuts, the airline, once the world's largest, has all but abandoned an ambitious plan to offer business-jet service to its premium clients. It froze investment in the biz-jet unit, dubbed Avolar, estimated at more than $80 million. Unions had opposed the plan for Avolar, for which United had ordered or optioned more than 150 jets.
Six months after it lost two jets to terrorists, United announced plans to boost daily flights from its O'Hare hub by 15% as of 7 June, recall hundreds of furloughed employees in support and return to traditional advertising themes that stress passenger service.
Joseph Schwieterman, an airline expert at the Chaddick Institute of Chicago's DePaul University, says United is moving dramatically to reassert itself. He says: "After reacting to crisis for the past several years, United is moving to control its destiny again."
The carrier's move to reassert dominance at O'Hare - where rival American Airlines now nearly equals United in market share - is as much about re-establishing its identity as is the advertising campaign.
O'Hare, says Chris Bowers, United's senior vice-president of marketing and sales, is the airline's heart and soul. The ads, he says, "are a reason to believe in United".
Though the Avolar and recall moves have pleased employees, the company must still negotiate wage concessions with a group of baggage handlers represented by the machinists union and with its pilots union. Neither negotiation will be easy, according to chief executive Jack Creighton.
Source: Airline Business
