Colby on a recent flight. Imagine if the seat were reclined. He can't even make the tray table go flat.
A while back Colby, a 7 foot tall man, emailed me asking to look into what airlines could do to make flying for tall people easier. At first I didn’t think too much about it. “Why should airlines be concerned about taller passengers?”
Then I got thinking. Why not? We have heard a lot recently about the passengers of size issue, where larger passengers are required to purchase two seats. Yes, it can be harder for some people, but for almost all, there is that choice (coming from someone who is larger myself). If someone can’t help their large size, they can get it documented and then the airline does have to accommodate them at no cost to the passenger. Now, being short is considered a disability, but not being tall. Our culture seems to love tall people. From athletes to people wearing taller shoes and even having surgery to get taller. People might look up to you (pun intended), but it doesn’t make flying an easy task.
So, I pose the question: Should Airlines Accommodate Tall Passengers? I say yes.
I am not talking about letting tall passengers get first class seats for free, but what about letting taller passengers have first dibs on exit row or bulk head seats? I believe there is a no-cost solution for airlines here and I really want to explore possible solutions more.
When flying, Colby tries very hard to try and get an exit or bulk head seat, but he doesn’t always get one. Every time he flies he arrives to the airport early to see if he can try and get a seat with additional leg room. He will first talk to the person at the ticket counter. If that doesn’t work he will try and see if someone at the gate can help him out. If that doesn’t work most times people sitting at the bulkhead or exit row seats are happy to change seats with him when they see him hunched over walking down the aisle. He flies quite a bit and sometimes it doesn’t matter how hard he tries, there are quite a few times he will end up in a normal seat and having to endure the flight.
It's not Colby's fault he is 7' tall. Should airlines help the little guy out?
So what could be done? Colby is looking for airlines to be a bit more consistent with with how they deal with tall passengers. Some are very accommodating others are not. Certain airlines charge passengers more to sit in the bulkhead or exit and giving up those seats for free to tall passengers would mean loss revenue. Others , you have to pay to get a seat assignment or it is open seating and it is mad-dash for prime seats.
Thing is Colby is a pretty out going guy and has no problem asking a bunch of people if he can get a seat with more legroom. He sees other, not as outgoing tall people, who don’t ask and are constantly stuck crammed in a seat during their flight.
I plan to try and help out Colby and others that are in his same situation. At 6’1″ I am not a short person, but am still able to make sitting in standard seats work. I plan to talk to people in the industry to see what solutions airlines might be able to offer tall passengers and hopefully get some feedback from you, my readers.
What are your thoughts on this? Should airlines provide solutions? If so, what solutions should they provide?
Hanging out with two awesome United Airlines flight attendants on the tarmac at LAX. That's a sweet Boeing 747-400 behind us.
I am an airline advocate. There are lots of media sources and people that love to bash the airlines. If an airline does something major enough to deserve a good bashing, then I will give it to them, but mostly I try to find the positive even in a negative situation.
When I recently connected with Rahsaan Johnson with United Communications while in Chicago earlier in the month, I was dead honest with him. I told him that I feel as though many are under the impression that United Airlines is lacking spirit. Being one who always wants to find the silver-lining with airlines, I wanted him to help let me show people that there is spirit within United.
It wasn’t long before Johnson thought of an idea to help me see, first hand, the energy and spirit most United employees have. I was invited for a day trip down from Seattle to Los Angelas (LAX) to see United connect with some of their best customers, experience some unique things and witness the delivery of Emmys.
United Airlines pilots talking to customers about what they do before flight.
The morning I left, I posted about the font change of the new Continental and United merger. Throughout the day I was getting some critical comments from you, my readers, about United’s perceived service and I was reading each one to Johnson to give him an idea of your impressions. You all echoed what we have both seen and heard from other sources.
After interacting and connecting with so many United employees and customers through out the day (on and more importantly off record), I honestly feel United is heading in the right direction. A lot of people I spoke with will openly admit they know that United has had their ups and downs, but everyone I spoke with feels positive with the direction United is heading and pumped about the likely merger with Continental.
Two United Airlines pilots welcome the Emmys to LAX
Things have changed a lot for United Airlines in the past forty years. From deregulation, to a few spikes in oil prices, to strong competition from low cost carriers and of course bankruptcy in 2002, United has persevered through it all.
There are a lot of hard working employees who are there to treat their customers well. During my visit to LAX, United invited important customers and showed them how they operate. This was to share what they are looking to do in the future and get feedback from customers on how they can improve their performance. They were able to get helpful feedback on schedules, and service, even down to having the proper ratio of cheese to crackers.
United Airlines Boeing 757 and Continental Airlines Boeing 737 get close at LAX. Two airlines will (most likely) become one soon!
Not only was United able to share what they are up to with special customers, they were also able to share the Emmys with everyone. Later in the afternoon, the Emmys were flown from Chicago to LAX on United Airlines. They had nice comfy seats up front and were welcomed by a crowd of people in the terminal. Being the huge airline nerd I am, when I was told the Emmys were being flown in, the first thing I asked is, “What kind of plane they will be flying in?” (It was an Airbus A320). Hey I am an airline reporter, not TV awards reporter! Yet it is always cool to see not only customers, but employees get really excited about an event like this. It does show there is some great spirit alive and ready to grow at United!
The people that I spoke with are very excited about the merger with Continental. Changes like this inject a feeling of motivation (for those not losing their jobs that happen in any merger) about the future. Continental and United both have interesting histories and will most likely make a solid future together.
Over the next few weeks I will share some of the very cool things I got to experience on my full day at LAX… a tour of the upper deck and cockpit of a Boeing 747-400, riding on a tug while pushing back a Boeing 757 and having an amazing view of LAX from the old FAA tower. Stay tuned!
A Frontier Q400 at Aspen. Check the Delta and United planes in the background.
Remember that one time, when I told you that Frontier and Delta would pull out of Aspen, leaving only United Airlines? Yea, now that is only partly true. Delta is still out of there, but Frontier will be sticking around for at least a while.
The same day that Frontier announced it would stick around at least through the winter, United announced it would add additional service.
Frontier was planning to be rid of their fleet of Q400’s that fly into Aspen, but due to leasing issues, three aircraft will remain available to fly for Frontier.
Who is this good for? Well surely the employees for Frontier who were told they were out of a job starting September 30th and now have work until April. It also is good for passengers, since the competition will surely keep fares lower. Probably United is the only one who comes out of this in a worse position. They assumed that they would become the only airline in town and started to increase flight accordingly.
Source: Aspen Times Image: frontierflickr
Kulula Airline's This Way Up livery on a Boeing Boeing 737-800 (ZS-ZWO)
This is the third time that Kulula Airlines has made it to my airline livery of the week. A unique honor for them, but they just keep coming up with such clever liveries! Previously I looked at their Flying 101 livery and their swirly livery. Where I think the Flying 101 is better, this one is easier to get and read.
Image: Sean Mowatt used with permission from Airliners.net
The first Boeing 747-8 completes taxi tests at Paine Field
Not that long ago Boeing entered into the world of social media and I wanted to take a moment to see how it is going.
Personally, I have seen huge changes in the past six months in regards to Boeing and social media. They have come an extremely long way when it comes to connecting with regular people like me and you since I started this blog just over two years ago. By making a huge push, I think they have been highly successful. However, I wanted to see how Boeing feels about their progress.
I decided to speak with Todd Blecher, Communications Director at Boeing based in Chicago, and Bernard Choi, who works for the Communications Department for Boeing Commercial Airplanes in Seattle, to hear their take on Boeing’s progress.
When I asked Blecher if he felt their efforts have been successful he responded with: “I look at success on two levels. The first is whether we consistently generate appealing digital content. The reactions we’ve received since we started using Boeing.com as a storytelling platform and engaging through Twitter lead me to believe that we do.”
Blecher admitted that he wished their numbers were a little higher for the unique content they are creating on their website, but they were very happy with how their efforts at Farnborough turned out. “Our Farnborough micro site was a watershed moment, coming just a few months after we began communicating differently through Boeing.com,” Blecher stated. “We attracted 103,710 visitors who made more than 225,000 visits and 222,300 views of our videos. That was remarkable for us. I’m very proud of that effort.”
A new Cathay Pacific Boeing 777 test flying at Paine Field
On top of making a lot of great and unique content on their website, Boeing has also been making a great effort to interact with their employees, different airlines and fans on Twitter.
I have found that a lot of companies don’t know how to make Twitter work for them. Many will have a Twitter account because they feel they need one, but they don’t know why. Talking with Blecher, I can tell he gets it. “Social media’s value rests in allowing organizations to engage in a dialogue with people around the world that can benefit both sides of that equation, and do that at very low cost,” he explained. Boeing is not on Twitter because they want to look like they are in-touch, they are on Twitter because they want to change how they communicate to the outside world (being media, airlines and fans like you) permanently and more effectively, using technology.
Working Boeing’s three Twitter accounts (@BoeingAirplanes, @BoeingCorporate and @BoeingDefense) is very much a team effort. Blecher watches over @BoeingCorporate, Choi works on @BoeingAirplanes and Maribeth Bruno in Boeing Defense Communication watches over @BoeingDefense. I know that some larger companies have to go through a lot of hurdles to get something posted to Twitter, but Boeing makes it easy.
I have heard of horror stories from other companies, where they want to Tweet something, but it has to be approved half way around the world by five different people. It might take up to 12 hours to finally Tweet and by then, the moment is lost.
Boeing's hangars in Everett, WA (don't worry I was passenger when taking this photo)
Blecher pointed out that Boeing is actually pretty flexible with allowing people to Tweet. All three of them that oversee the Twitter accounts are trained professionals and are able to use their own judgment on what is alright to Tweet. “Since our tweeters are media relations people by trade we all know what’s ok and what’s not ok for a tweet.” Blecher continued, “We’re used to being on a high wire without a net, so to speak. Therefore, most of our tweets aren’t subjected to lengthy review.”
He did clarify that if a Tweet is program related (ie what the 787 might be doing), they will speak with people in that department to make sure they have accurate information. On rare occasions there might be longer discussions before a Tweet goes public.
Choi explained that he might confer with a colleague, but he has the ability to use his judgment when to make a Tweet go live, “I’ll bounce ideas off of my colleagues, but there isn’t an official approval process.” There is a lot going on at Boeing all the time and it can’t all be Tweeted. I asked Choi how he gets his information, like when Randy Tinseth posts a new blog, does he get a heads up? He explained that sometimes he might, “get a heads up that Randy’s got a new blog coming or I’ll just wait like everyone else. I don’t tweet every blog entry, just as I don’t tweet every Boeing news release. It’s fairly subjective. We don’t want to overtweet, so we look for the highlights or just interesting nuggets to tweet. As you can imagine, we’re still learning as we go.” And Boeing has been learning.
Let’s take a look at what happened just last night. Boeing knew it was going to have to announce that the Boeing 787 will be delayed again. They posted their press release and Tweeted out the delay pretty much at the same time. Even though there were rumors that Boeing would release this information, they were the first one on Twitter to have the official confirmation. It was about another 15 minutes before other Twitter people responded to their original Tweet. That is being proactive and not everyone would be willing to Tweet out bad news like that.
Boeing 787 Dreamliner ZA001 during its taxi testing with Dreamlifter in the background.
Boeing has learned a lot from their interactions on Twitter, from posting online media and their Boeing Store Facebook account. They are hoping to use that information to continue to grow their online presence. They hope to launch an official Boeing Facebook page (there is currently an unofficial one with 30,000 fans) and YouTube channel to share videos with the public and believe me, they have some really cool stuff.
Speaking about cool stuff, Boeing is still hip with the idea of having a TweetUp sometime. That is where a bunch of airline nerds like us (don’t take offense to that, just figure you might be one if you’re reading this) get together and talk about airplanes and do some cool things (there was one last year called Aviation Geekfest). One sponsored by Boeing won’t happen soon (there is a lot of red tape), but they are motivated to try and make it work someday (And I will continue to keep reminding them).
They are currently happy with the progress they have made, yet are still cautious about growing their online presence too quickly. “With any of these tools we have to walk before we run,” Blecher explained. “We’re far ahead of where I expected we’d be and while I’d love for us to be moving faster, I realize that trying to move too fast could put our efforts at risk. A couple of high-profile mistakes in the social sphere could really set us back.” That is a very wise approach to take. Many airlines have hopped on to the online bandwagon with great momentum, just to fizzle out with time and leaving people wondering what happened. You also don’t want to be venturing into new technology without fully understanding the impact it could have on your business or your customers.
From speaking with Blecher and Choi multiple times through their transition, I constantly get the feeling that they get it. They aren’t just pushing Boeing into the online realm because it is the new fad. Boeing is very well known for being innovative and cutting edge in many of the things they accomplish. Now they want to take that Boeing innovation mentality to the way they communicate with the outside world.