American Airlines finally realizes they need to offer a more premium product to generate more revenue. For years they focused on competing with Spirit and Frontier, and thought that their schedule alone was the product and all they needed to do was operate on-time. That turned out to be table stakes.
Planes don’t make money when they’re on the ground, so airlines want to schedule as little time between flights as possible. so cleaners board while passengers are getting off the planes and begin boarding the next flight as soon as passengers from the last one are off, “Agents should not wait for a call from the cleaners to begin the boarding process.” And cleaners are supposed to “get off the aircraft once they…see passengers starting to board.”
American’s approach has been D0 – or departing exactly on-time – yet prioritizing this over everything else hasn’t made them more on-time. However the D in D0 has also stood for dirty.
Part of the ‘premium pivot’ means paying attention to cabin maintenance and appearance, but that will entail a huge culture shift. One commenter explains just how much the airline is up against if they are to make this shift. This American Airlines employee says they were offered therapy for their insistence on getting aircraft clean between flights.
Currently work for AA at a small station, I complained that I wasn’t being given enough time to clean the planes, and was told to skip steps. I said I just wanted to do a good job, but the “no delays” mentality meant I had to do what I consider a subpar job. Was told to “not take it so personally” and that they had therapy services available. I wish I was joking.
American is adding business class suites with doors to new delivery Boeing 787-9s and retrofitting their Boeing 777-300ERs with these as well. Narrowbody A321XLRs will have suites also. But there are no announced plans to retrofit any of the rest of their fleet, which will remain a hodgepodge of different premium seats. And this decision long predates any shift to premium.
Credit: American Airlines
They are adding high speed wifi to regional jets, but they’re forced into the position because of the deprecation of the old air to ground network. They are finally building their business class lounge in Philadelphia, but Flagship lounges lag United Polaris lounges and Delta One lounges in experience.
Credit: American Airlines
So far there’s been a ‘me too, but less’ philosophy and that’s deeply engrained in the culture. They rolled out new amenity kits where much of the contents are the same in first, business and premium economy classes but it was still an improvement over cardboard boxes.
@AmericanAir come on! Really? pic.twitter.com/f1NClr1l8w
— NC Man (@NCMan2020) January 14, 2024
New lounge food similarly reflects the idea that they need to show some increased investment, but not as much as competitors.
And perhaps they’re making this pivot right as the economy becomes less able to support it, although Delta says they’ve seen no degradation in premium demand. We’ll see just how real the shift at American Airlines is, and whether they can execute and generate financial returns closer to peers.
Based on a lot of the domestic schedule a cleaning crew has maybe five minutes to clean before it’s T-35 or T-30 and boarding is due to start. More and more it seems gate agents start to board Pre Boards, CK and Group and when you get on the jetbridge you’re held while cleaners need to finish. Add in the ever growing number of wheelchairs and a lot of boardings have turned into a total cluster.
So do you want to leave on time or want a cleaner plane? I’d take the former.
Ah, an example of DARVO–Deny, Attack, Reverse Victim and Offender–a classic abusive tactic. Call it out when you sell it, all ye decent remaining folk out there.
Seriously, management needs to actually lead, pay and support their workers better, and actually serve the passengers, not just the C-suite, oligarchs, and majority shareholders. Wake up, peasants!
Yes, American Airlines needs to clean their planes to a much higher level of clean- thought it was just dumb luck when I had not so clean seat areas more than a few times but guess it wasn’t so random – rather leave five minutes later-
787’s and A350’s are engineering and technical marvels, near the pinnacle of human achievement , and airlines spend 100’s of millions of dollars to purchase them. I simply do not understand the management mindset that can take an asset like that and allow it to become trashed and filthy just because of poor management decisions. Makes me seriously wonder what other more serious things, like the engines and airframes, are also so poorly maintained on these planes. Could also say the same about the passengers that trash and disrespect the planes as well.
@jcil — Well said. On the passengers, it does come down to ‘culture’ and societal expectations. In the USA, at least, we are conditioned to be ‘rugged individualists’ who are only supposed to care about ourselves–otherwise, you’d be a commie, hippie, socialist Democrat, right? But, hey, if we want to actually take better care of ourselves, our surroundings, etc., maybe, leaders should lead that way. Like, create the incentives, encourage us to build each other up, instead of tear each other down, fight corruption instead of proliferating it, actually have accountability and transparency, and like, also, follow the money, because that’s usually the real reason. Also, Americans are not Japanese.
It’s actually quite staggering what the disconnect is between customers and the Airlines compared to other businesses. People have little idea what amenities are going to be on the plane you’re trying to select unless you go digging, and even then aircraft with headrest screens offer the poorest selection of entertainment possible. You could fit a catalog 100x bigger on the tiniest of storage, but no, you get to watch 3 random shows from a series that has 10 seasons. It seems hard to believe the people working in management at the airlines are so dense, but here we are. Even offering better food selections would make them more money. Have they compared profit from selling overpriced food to passenger revenue if trying to decide to take up two more seats with food carts? I’d love to see that data.
American’s problem is that their employees don’t provide premium customer service. It’s very simple to become a premium carrier: create a system that a customer-facing employee gets progressive discipline up to dismissal for any complaint from a premium or elite passenger. 3 strikes and you’re out. Watch your net promoter score soar when employees treat high-value customers right!
Flew from SRQ to BHM with a connection in CLT this seek on AA. The CRJ to and from BHM was filthy as was the A320 from SRQ to CLT. I tweeted to AA and noted the extremely dirty plane and they responded with ” We will let senior management know.”
Do you think senior management does not already know their planes are flying pig styes?
Gary Leff writes, “D in D0 has also stood for dirty.” When flying on American Airlines, I know D stands for any of the following: dusty, disheveled, draggled, disarranged, or disordered. Passenger behavior can be disgusting or depraved.
No pre-departure beverages are disgraceful, making AA disreputable. This dastardly, despicable, detestable airline is dishonorable and managed by degenerates. I would like to fly Delta if the AA flight crew becomes more demoralized.
@George — I think they just about ‘act their wage’—You want ‘premium’ service, then let’s support airlines whose leadership ensures ‘premium’ compensation and benefits. Are you one of those folks that yells at servers and bus boys when you go out to eat? Calling ‘em, lazy, entitled, etc.? Because, if you do, please stop that—like, you’re getting spit in your food, sir.
American is never going to be able to do “premium” and certainly not with the current leadership. I am a well trained AA customer: if there is no obvious puke on my revenue first seat, then I am happy. “You Get What You Deserve on American Airlines.” This is all a sad joke of lies to Wall Street to keep the C-Suite from being terminated. All hat no cattle to the DFW based airline.
AA management doesn’t give a rats ass about cleanliness on the plane or terminals. Even when they pretended during the scamdemic with their “clean commitment” it was a PR stunt and as big a ruse now as it was then.
It’s D-0 or bust.
I’m sure hardly cleaning the planes does wonder for employee morale. They’ll start losing the employees who actually care about the job they’re supposed to be doing to the competition.
I don’t know what it takes to get AA management to understand that clean planes matter. Passengers start wondering if other departments like maintenance is that sloppy, too.
Until Isom is gone, and the other folks from US and HP, it will always be a matter of doing the least to make it look like you are doing enough. The lack of vision, creativity and innovation is absent from top to bottom at SkyView, it permeates from the top down, but there are many untalented mid-level people at AA too…time to stop making excuses for them. Also, can we talk about their new CXO lady? They put an efficiency and cost-cutting expert from US in the position instead of bringing in real customer experience professionals from the outside…shows where their priorities really are.
George….that was the mindset from management to gate agents. Punitive toward the agents when flights didn’t go out exactly on time. We see how well that worked. I think scaring people into giving good customer service is the wrong approach.
@1990 I do not yell or get into conflicts with anyone who handles my food, thank you. American cabin crew are overpaid by global standards — over $70k median! — for a simple job. Most cabin crew at premium carriers globally are paid half that or less. At most carriers around the world, cabin crew start at $15-20k and top out at roughly double that.
If American’s overpaid cabin crew can’t provide premium service to premium passengers, they should be fired and replaced.
Until Robert Isom is gone American will continue its downward spiral. And go out of business.
United is the new Pan Am on the Pacific & Delta the new TWA over the Atlantic.
American is the future Eastern Airlines & it shows every day. Their only true assets are LHR & South America landing slots & their employees. Yet Isom isn’t in any form an intellectual thinker. He’s a weak, wimpy caricature of a CEO without any leadership skills whatsoever.
And he’s proving that without a shadow of a doubt. He is not even successful fulfilling his fiduciary duties.
The only thing that Isom has in common with Robert Crandall is his first name. Period.
Scotch Kirby has proven that even someone thoroughly indoctrinated into the AmericaWest ULCC mentality can somewhat escape to seeing some things through normal eyes. Not enough things but more than his prior cohorts. While I have about zero confidence that American actually will make the needed changes I suppose at least making some halfhearted and half a$$ed attempt beats the status quo.
I personally don’t understand why American’s Board Of Directors doesn’t bring in leadership or at least capable management rather than continuing with CEO’s who just don’t understand the concept of running a quality airline of American’s scale.
@George — I wouldn’t call it ‘simple,’ given the special training required and the higher risk environment compared to most ‘desk jobs,’ and I certainly wouldn’t call it ‘overpaid,’ either. Nearly all flight attendants are meeting or exceeding expectations, even at American. I just don’t understand why you and some others are often so quick to denigrate the workers. Like, what inspires your ire?
@1990 I can’t speak for others, but I think for me it’s a mismatch between the expectations set and the service offered in many cases. How many times have you heard the line “let us know if there is any way we can make your flight more comfortable” and how many times has any request to this effect actually been honored? So, why say it and set up that expectation if you don’t plan to do anything to accomplish it? It puts the crew in an impossible situation and causes customers to feel upset and used.
I have had flights with outstanding flight attendants (across all airlines–although tbf can’t remember the last time I flew AA). I have had flights with seemingly invisible but competent FAs, and I’ve had terrible FAs. The majority of difference is simply attitude because they seem to have little to no power over actually affecting your experience beyond that. I had a United FA recognize that the footrest in my J seat was broken, something I practically didn’t care about, was just checking to make sure it wasn’t operator error (I wasn’t even complaining, immediately let it go), and she proactively offered me a $125 ETC. And this was on an upgrade, not even a full revenue purchase from me. That was nearly five years and at least two hundred flights ago and I still remember.
So, for me I think the “simple” point is that even when you recognize that FAs have so little agency in terms of the customer experience they can make a huge difference in customer satisfaction by virtue of their attitude. Honestly, even if she hadn’t offered that ETC, the fact that she took it seriously and was apologetic and agreed it shouldn’t have happened was a big deal. I remember from almost TEN YEARS ago now an FA on KLM on an eleven hour flight simply shrugging that the audio on my entertainment system didn’t work (I asked to be moved to a different seat and she said it wasn’t her problem and I should wander the plane and find somewhere else to sit–but economy only and she was very firm about that). You know which airline I haven’t flown since then, not once? KLM. And you know which airline I point to whenever someone complains about airlines? KLM. I say their planes are outdated, basic systems don’t work and aren’t maintained, and their FAs are terrible. Every time. Including now!!!
All this is USAir culture , not AA corporate culture period.
This is in reference to “George N Romey says:”, there is absolutely no way I’m going to pick between on time vs clean airplanes. That’s what competition is called. You can do a lot more than caving to that philosophy.
AA has plenty of time every evening to do a deep clean on the aircraft. Why don’t they do this, because it is something that would cost $$$’s. Using the excuse that they don’t have time between flights is a joke. If the aircraft got a good clean every night when they are parked for 6-8 hours this would not be a problem and the quick clean between flights would be fine. Not every customer is a disgusting pig when seated, only some.
ISOM has already said do not spend any extra $$$’s and that is the culture.
@1990 I call it overpaid by global standards. And I’m not saying that they should be paid less, I’m saying standards should be raised to justify their high salaries. What exactly do flight attendants in the U.S. do to justify being paid double or more what their global counterparts get paid?
I’ll grant you that there are flight attendants who provide good service even in America. Those crew should be empowered by terminating those who generate complaints from premium customers.
George isn’t worth responding to.
Glad he was never on my flight.
They can’t even run an on-time airline despite Isom saying it’s the most important thing. Mechanical delay after mechanical delay. They discipline poor gate agent for a 5 minute delay but have done nothing to the senior members of management in charge of aircraft maintenance. This number of mechanical delays should have resulted in the VP of line maintenance or the VP of technical operations to be fired.
This is nothing new. American Airlines has been dog crap for decades.
I fly AA all the time and unless a plane has been there overnight, they’re generally pretty filthy. I’d choose another airline but they’re so dominant in PHL, that to save time I usually have to fly them.
The real American Airlines before 2012 not US Airways who merge with AA took over from A – Z all operations, meaning loosing (outsourcing) the cleaning of the aircraft cabin done by the TWU/Fleet Service Clerk by an other company named AirServ/ABM. With this merger all aircraft cabin (Cabin Service) declined in cleaning performance and this is were we are today. BRING BACK CABIN SERVICE BY TWU.
It has been years since I worked for AA. Bob Crandall’s philosophy was that if the was a dirty airplane tray, and messy cabins, passengers would thing there was something wrong with the engines. He was right! This regime has taken a great airline and driven into the ground.
I hear men in their twenties talking about quiet quitting and only putting in the bare minimum effort at work. They scoff when I say hard work pays. I don’t think it’s coincidence that my generation was the generation of made in America. The United States invented the microchip that’s used in every thing we use today. Hard work means you have to work your way.up the ladder. Nobody gave us sh!t. Nobody talked about unfair wages or DEI. You take pride in your work.
I’m so grateful I was able to live my life in the once greatest country in the world. I worked with real men. Men don’t complain and play the victim. Yell a bunch of weak as$ girls.
Fly PHL to EYW frequently on AA. The PHL to EYW leg is usually great. The EYW to PHL usually does not leave on time and there’s always some BS excuse. I didn’t end up getting home until 2 AM. My flight was supposed to depart at 5 PM.