Why am I not surprised by the whining?

By: Ben Schlappig

Published: February 8, 2009

29 comments

How sad. Continental puts together an incredible event that blows away 500 very frequent flyers directly and thousands of others indirectly, and the unions and disgruntled employees try to use this as a cheap shot against management. As a United flyer I was truly impressed by Continental this weekend, by their management team, their employees, and the company overall. It’s sad that some employees would be trying to work against this and ruin our impression of the company.

The most common argument I’ve heard so far is that there are pilots furloughed, which makes this event a waste. What am I missing here? What does one thing have to do with the other? Guys, this was a marketing event, and a good one at that. Why don’t I hear anyone bitching when Continental puts up a billboard at Newark advertising a new route? It’s virtually the same thing, both are marketing tools….

This was a marketing expense, something Continental did in hopes of increasing loyalty and revenue. Heck, if anything, events like this would bring back more pilots, since they hopefully bring additional customers to the airline. Is that concept so difficult to understand?

Captain Pierce, the CAL MEC Chairman even left a comment in the other post I wrote about the event. Here are a few of the highlights:

While I have no problem with promoting our airline and rewarding our high paying passengers, taking a couple of hundred bloggers on a couple of hour long joy ride around Texas seems excessive by any standard.

Sorry, but you don’t even have your facts straight. It wasn’t a couple of hundred bloggers, but instead a mix of your most loyal customers, potential customers and yes, even a few bloggers. It’s excessive by any standard? Boy, you really seem to be good at making generalizations.

Have they not learned anything from other companies’ bad press due their excesses with these types of events?

You’re kidding me, right? What company has done such a thing by rewarding their CUSTOMERS (and NOT their executives)? There’s a difference between a big bonus for an executive and rewarding your customers. One is disgusting and one is good business.

I hope everyone enjoyed the reported low pass over Hobby. It is very likely that one or more of our furloughed brothers was washing or fueling airplanes directly below in order feed his family.

Noise.

The insensitivity is even greater with 147 pilots on furlough.

See above. The two things are unrelated.

No matter the expense of the event the perceptions of waste and excess far outweigh any possible benefits.

You really think what ultimately came out of this event was a perception of waste and excess? Not a perception of goodwill, generosity, good leadership, and a strong company?

Sorry, but your attitude is disgusting. Continental truly amazed us all with this event, and if you look anywhere except the ALPA website or crew forums, you’ll see nothing but positive reviews and responses.

You know, you guys really don’t know how good you have it. Being a United frequent flyer I’m used to the awful management style of Tilton & Co. You have a management team that is competent and genuinely cares about the success of the company, which includes the employees, customers, and of course shareholders.

Regardless, I will continue to post pictures of the incredible event, as I know all of my regular readers and even 90% of the people linked here will appreciate them. Spam away, ALPA and crew forums, as I’m sure you will.

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Annoyed Employee Guest

February 25, 2009, 9:02 pm

This was a stunning waste of resources- Will anyone on this flight buy another CO ticket that that they would not have bought with out this joy ride? NO Was this event for new corporate account buyers that could actually generate some business? NO Is this the type of service you will recieve on CO if this stunt had actually prompted you to buy a ticket on the airline? NO, muchof the behavior chronicled would have generated a divert and removal from my airplane. If the goal was to show off CO aircraft and service (which is still better than most others) this could have been done while never leaving the hangar saving thousands of dollars and thousands of tons of carbon emissions. I am beat over the head everyday about how to save 100 pounds of jet fuel. These flights burned more than I will be able to save in my entire career. A silly stunt that leaves most of us shaking our heads.

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ttjoseph Guest

February 11, 2009, 8:34 pm

Outraged CAL pilot, I'm surprised that you're second-guessing your company and union pilots who were flying that aircraft. Wouldn't they have made sure the flight was safe? After all, it was their responsibility. If CAL pilots do not control the aircraft they fly, you have much bigger problems than sour grapes over a party. I'm also amazed at the vitriol directed against the idea of maintaining a good relationship with high dollar pax. These FlyerTalkers are not purely miles-scroungers; they also shape their companies' travel policies and pay high fares to fly on short notice on business. And they have a choice - many have elite status across multiple alliances, and it's easy for them to defect from CAL. Marketing efforts like this are the reason that even more pilots are not furloughed. These customers are the ones paying your salary. Don't you want to keep them around? (P.S. Lucky is a presumably high-dollar UAL flyer but when CAL joins Star Alliance he will have strong incentive to fly CAL too. Would you rather UAL get his business?)

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Outraged CAL pilot Guest

February 11, 2009, 4:49 pm

Marketing expense is one thing. This escapade was a gross misjudgment which was full of negligence. Numerous FARs and policy procedures were broken and now videos of it all are flowing over the internet. How can the TSA/ FBI honestly take security seriously when they allow unfettered cockpit access by a bunch inebriated passengers, none of whom have had background checks? US airline crews go through 20+ year rigorous FBI checks to verify we are indeed to be trusted with what could be deemed as a loaded weapon. We are trained, instructed and strictly required to protect the cockpit door at all costs. I cannot divulge our security procedures but, trust me, they are extremely comprehensive in the interest of security and safety. All of that was thrown out the window while even greater risk was placed on aviation security as a whole when passenger after passenger joy-rided the cockpit jumpseat, drunk or not. As a professional pilot, I care not to see such mediocre stunts played out over the internet, especially when it is my airine. As far as the furloughed issue... well, there is obviously no convincing you, but you'd better believe it we will look at every unnecessary expense with a mircoscope while our pilots pay the price for mgmt mistakes. I'm sorry you see the plight of our jobless pilot as "noise". Good thing you're a UAL flyer... wait, I thought you said this stunt was for our frequent flyers.

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lucky New Member

February 10, 2009, 11:31 pm

redflyer, that's classless and disgusting, I completely agree with you. Let me simply say that this was a group of over 500 people. There are bound to be some classless people among them, no? People like that make me ashamed to be a member of FlyerTalk, and I'd like to apologize on behalf of 99% of customers for their actions. I certainly didn't engage in that type of activity, and neither did most of the people at the event, so please don't put us all in the same category.

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redflyer Guest

February 10, 2009, 11:23 pm

Here's a link to a picture, or rather set of them. I can see why CAL is so intent on impressing "high dollar" customers. Is this the caliber of customer to which you all were referring? http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=38462785&id=11309400&l=b18dd The internet is flooded with pictures like these. While I will not and cannot speak for my company, please accept my personal apology for having your weekend invaded by this level of immaturity.

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