Originally Posted by
anabolism
I see two distinct questions implicit in your post:
- Assuming for sake of discussion that AA keeps CK pretty much the same and UA also stays the same, for you as a CK, would you rather have a better experience when things go wrong but miss some upgrades, or, have much better upgrade success but not as good handling during problems?
- Would AA be better off overall by making CK a top tier and hence downgrading the experience of lowly EXPs, or keeping things as they are? That is, would the additional revenue gained by catering more to CKs be greater than revenue lost by pissed-off EXPs who defect?
I think I answered the first question in my inital post. Obviously I do value the way CK handles things when times get tough. That's why I haven't jumped ship.
As for your second question, while I agree it would piss off some EXPs, I don't know where they would go. United already has GS. Delta? Skypesos? Maybe. But I doubt it. (and off topic, but from what I understand Delta already has an informal CK/GS-type program and soon will have a formal one that may in fact sit on top of Diamond)
In fact, I doubt elevating CK would have that much of an effect for the majority of EXPs. How many CKs are there? On most routes I'm one of maybe two on the plane (when I've seen the manifest). On a few routes (for example 6AM ORD-LGA) there are a bunch of us, but those routes are few and far between (or at least it seems so to me).
It strikes me that offering status matches to EXP and double EQM offers dilute the value of EXP much more than elevating a relatively small group of people to a higher upgrade status.