Originally Posted by manhattan92
I love CO's domestic service and especially appreciate its decision not to punish passengers after 9/11 by being the only major airline to keep amenities such as meals, pillows. etc. CO is a very professionally run operation and I would never take my loyalty elsewhere on a domestic flight.
But, if I am paying $5,000 for a business class flight to Frankfurt and another carrier charges me the same fare but offers onboard internet access, sleeper seats, a lounge with full gourmet meals and on-demand in flight entertainment, I don't need an MBA to choose more product for the same money. Maybe this is clearer: I pay $10 dollars and can get 10 oranges or I pay $10 dollars and can get 10 oranges and 2 apples.
I honestly don’t understand the difficulty in understanding consumer perception of “value” as a determinative factor in purchasing decisions. Since you asked, here is a sample of a 1st year business school synopsis:
“Consumer Behavior --- Marketing begins and ends with the customer, from determining customer needs and developing high quality products and services to providing customer satisfaction. The design of a successful marketing strategy requires an accurate understanding of customer perceptions, judgments, feelings, values, choices, and behavior. The course focuses on concepts, issues, and trends about customer behavior and customer orientation. It provides students with specific research tools to generate insights about customers and with experience in applying them to the analysis of marketing problems and design of marketing strategy.” (University of Michigan Business School Course on Consumer Behavior).
I actually care deeply for CO and have many good things to say about the airline and the people behind it. The point of my original post was to invite reasonable discussion from other passengers with the hope of influencing CO’s thinking down the line. I was careful to point out the good and bad in CO’s BF product. I think it is unproductive and almost immature for replies like “If you don’t like CO why do you fly it? etc.” I can be a loyal CO flyer and criticize them sometimes—the two concepts are not mutually exclusive, n’est-ce pas, Vincent?
Agreed 100%. Those of us who care about CO and the value it once delivered offer these critiques not because we feel like being negative, but because it's become all too obvious that CO is starting to fall behind the competition in a number of significant areas.
While it's clear the direct reason is the competitive pressures I think the true cause for the shift in direction at CO is attributable to the management philosophy of Larry Kellner.
Since he is the hand-picked protege of Gorden Bethune it is not immediately obvious how different of a manager he is than Bethune. The fact is, though, that while Kellner has been forced to operate in a very demanding marketplace, he has responded with a very unimaginative approach, focused solely on reducing cost.
In the meantime the competition has been busy and if CO continues along the same path, they will create a crisis of confidence in the airline.
Gordon Bethune also operated in a very trying circumstance but he understood that it is not enough to cut costs but that value must be added at every single turn.
The Kellner strategy has been good for CO's short-term balance sheet, but I believe the outlook for the next 72 months could be very different if something doesn't change.