Airlines

Category Archives for Airlines.

New Singapore A380 Suites Coming To U.S. March 27th – Congrats To Those Who Got Awards!

by Gary Leff

Dec 16 2021

Those of you who booked Singapore Airlines Suites from the U.S. to Frankfurt or onward to Singapore will be thrilled to know that Singapore not only plans to operate the Airbus A380 on this route but that starting March 27, 2022 they’ll be operating the A380 with the new cabins which means new Suites.

Unfortunately availability doesn’t look nearly as good as it did 5 days ago. Nonetheless many of you will be excited for the first-time introduction of new cabin to the U.S. This is absolutely one of the best products in the sky. Debates between this and the new Emirates first class and ANA first class are fun (please don’t bring something like Air France first into this debate, their ground experience in Paris notwithstanding).

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Airline CEOs Testified Before The Senate On Taxpayer Bailouts – But You’re The One Getting Fleeced

by Gary Leff

man speaking on microphone
Dec 16 2021

The Senate held a hearing full of mock outrage where Senators got to ask ill-informed questions of airline CEOs, and those CEOs got to give disingenuous answers about nearly $100 billion in taxpayer bailouts received during the pandemic.

There’s some truth in the grandstanding, but legislators should move beyond that and take real steps that would improve air travel in America.

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Lesson From The Deal Of The Year, Don’t Neglect Other SimplyMiles

by Gary Leff

Dec 15 2021

If you were going to buy from Wine.com or CVS anyway these are incredible deals, and maybe worth doing even if you weren’t going to. MovieClub was profitable on its own, but the charity offer if you had it was more lucrative and you probably didn’t want the MovieClub product. Vinesse wines are terrible (in my experience) but again miles worth more than the purchase price. Barnes & Noble effectively got you a rebate of the full value of a book (or other) purchase in the form of miles. And this isn’t the first time they ran a sextuple miles offer, they did it at the end of 2019 also.

All of which is to say this bonus highlights SimplyMiles and makes it something worth checking more often than I would have before.

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American’s Chief Commercial Officer Lays Out A New Vision For The Airline

by Gary Leff

Dec 15 2021

American Airlines Chief Commercial Officer Vasu Raja laid out a new vision for the carrier, as part of the announcement of a new senior leadership team that comes with Doug Parker’s stepping down as CEO and Robert Isom taking that position at the end of March.

It’s a customer-focused vision which isn’t something we’ve seen clearly articulated at American Airlines since US Airways took over. (“Caring for people on life’s journey” is too non-specific and milquetoast to count.)

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American Airlines Names New Senior Leadership Team – But One Spot Is Glaringly Vacant

by Gary Leff

Dec 14 2021

When American Airlines announced that Chairman and CEO Doug Parker would become non-executive Chairman on March 31, 2022 and current President Robert Isom would take over as CEO and join the board, I wrote that Executive Vice President of People and Communications Elise Eberwein would step down as well. That’s now official.

Robert Isom has named his new leadership team and it’s interesting as much for what hasn’t been stated as what has.

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Spirit Airlines Thinks They Can Win In Memphis With Fares So Low People Will Come From All Over

by Gary Leff

spirit plane
Dec 14 2021

Los Angeles is surprisingly lightly served from Memphis, with Delta offering non-daily service and Allegiant flying the route. There’s no United or American flights. Memphis – Las Vegas has limited service, from Allegiant and Frontier. And Memphis – Orlando has very limited service from Southwest and Frontier. All are routes where Spirit has a shot. And, for their strategy, if the fares are low enough people will come from all over.

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Three Routes With Great Business Class Award Space For A Family

by Gary Leff

japan airlines plane
Dec 14 2021

I’ve always known that the key to award travel is flexibility. The best deals are on seats that are going to go unsold. An airline doesn’t always know what seats those are, and may play it conservative not releasing award space until very close to departure. And even then they may be reluctant, worried that someone might redeem miles instead of spending big money on a ticket.

Right now uncertainty is even greater for airlines. How many people will be traveling? Will there be any business travelers, or will it be all leisure? Will there be restrictions on actually flying to a destination? Or perhaps restrictions on the number of flights a week that can be offered?

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Virgin Australia Drops Delta, Will Partner With United Instead

by Gary Leff

virgin airplane
Dec 13 2021

Virgin Australia is strategically important because they’re one of two significant airlines in Australia. Qantas is closely tied through a joint venture with American Airlines. So most airlines outside of the oneworld alliance (and Emirates) go looking for domestic feed for their long haul Australia routes with their competitor, Virgin Australia.

Virgin Down Under has been linked with Delta Air Lines through a joint business venture, leaving United Airlines in the cold. Its Australia flights have largely had to survive on local market passengers, rather than connecting people from all over Australia. That’s changing.

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