This might sound crazy, but it struck me last night that what comes through to us as business incompetence (website IT, SQM etc discrepancy, eupgrade hiccups, and so on) could be business genius, in that (i) it greatly increases the gamification of engaging with AC, and (ii) massively increases how much time we spend thinking about AC. Both (i) and (ii) (perversely) lead to greater brand loyalty.

This is a conjecture, but I'd bet that the drop off of annoyed customers leaving for other airlines (or just not taking flights) is LESS than the increased revenue that comes to AC through the much greater gamification/mental-engagement-time that keeps AC in front out of minds so much more of the day than it should be.

Reminds me of the news story a few years ago about a guy who realised that the more his vacuum sales business (or whatever it was, I can't remember) actively defrauded customers, the higher its search engine results were and the more sales he had (because online complaining drove him higher in search results, even though the top hits were all about how he was a thief). He was eventually convicted of fraud if I remember right, but he had a genius business model. I'm not suggesting it's quite the same with AC but I do think their 'incompetence' greatly increases gamification and mental dwell-time, and that > greater net brand loyalty.