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Posted Jun 3, 2011
Travel Weekly yesterday published comments from travel industry lawyer Mark Pestronk on American Airlines' Direct Connect program. I like Mark. He has helped out over the years, and much of what he said in that Travel Weekly piece seems about right to me. But not all of it. I felt compelled to respond.
Posted Sept 30, 2010
With newspaper headlines blaring about the planned acquisition of AirTran by Southwest Airlines, I thought that this would be the perfect opportunity to say the following:
Many of you know that my career background has a long stretch of experience working in airline sales. The last carrier I worked for before crossing over to the corporate purchasing side was Northwest/KLM.
Posted Jun 22, 2010
Biofuels are all the rage now. Earlier this month at the Berlin Airshow EADS demonstrated its ability to fly a small plane using 100% biofuel based on algae. But there are numerous solutions; Jatropha, Carmelina and even wood chips.
Posted Apr 2, 2010
Posted Dec 16, 2009
Forget about those frequent flier miles. Frequent flier miles add cost to the airfares your firm buys. And yes, firms have tried to cut those costs by stripping miles out of corporate fares, or by capturing employee-earned miles.
But it doesn’t work, for two reasons:
Posted Dec 11, 2009
Bulk buying makes sense for many commodities, but not airfares. Why? Because it’s complex and expensive.
Posted Mar 4, 2009
For many years debate has raged concerning the correct construction and use of international airline fares. The argument is all about interpretation and clever manipulation of rules which can result in travellers and their employers enjoying major savings if their agent is smart enough to know the "loopholes." Such intelligence was, and still should be, a key differentiator between savvy and average TMCs.
Posted Oct 13, 2008
One of the primary reasons for the demise of commissions was the desire by airlines to reduce their distribution costs. They also felt it would take out an intermediary, bring them closer to their end customers and give themselves a competitive edge. Their strategy was not resisted by corporations who saw it as a way to commoditise this vexing and rather antique type of purchasing, or at least make it far more transparent. After all, experience showed them that stripping a product down to its component parts makes it far easier to negotiate lower prices. There were mixed feelings amongst travel management companies. It varied around the world from despair and anger to others who saw it as an opportunity to survive and thrive whilst their peers faltered under the pressure of having to justify their role in the supply chain.
The end result has proved to be fascinating and I am not sure if any of the key stakeholders got what they wanted out of it.
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