American Airlines is refusing to accept the status quo in corporate travel distribution, pushing a strategy to move all indirect distribution to its XML-based "direct connection" to enable personalization, merchandizing and negotiated corporate "bundles." You've read about these moves and the strong industry reaction in
The Beat, and now we're thrilled to announce that AA's new managing director of distribution and merchandising strategy, Bridget Blaise-Shamai, has agreed to field 30 minutes of questions in our Hot Seat session at The Beat
Live, Sept. 20-22 in Chicago. Register today...
www.thebeat.travel/live
AA named Bridget Blaise-Shamai to run distribution and merchandising strategy following her three years as vice president of AAdvantage Marketing. Blaise-Shamai joined AA in 1995 after she spent time in Central Europe working on privatization plans for various state-owned companies. She earned a BA degree from Vanderbilt University and an MBA from Washington University, St. Louis.
Blaise-Shamai accompanies Hogg Robinson chief executive David Radcliffe, Travelport GDS CEO Gordon Wilson and other industry leaders as confirmed speakers for The Beat Live. Register today for our early-bird rate. The Beat
Live will take place at the W Chicago City Center.
www.thebeat.travel/live
Just for a moment, set your clock back about twenty years. Imagine a wild-eyed socialist screaming at Michael Dell and Steve Jobs about the the pain and suffering they were causing consumers by--gasp--their choices of product standards and distribution channels.
"You, Dell, need to make your computers available to the masses! In every store! Through every channel! Wherever the working man wishes to find it!"
"And you, Jobs, you need to build products that are open! That play nice with Windows! That fit the established order of things!"
As I ponder American Airlines' stated view of the future of distribution, I can't help but go back to my original
analogy of distribution economics. Indulge me Mr. Arpey. And please, tell me where I have missed the mark!
Imagine if you will, a manufacturer of goods - a soap manufacturer will do nicely for this story.
AMR CEO Gerard Arpey didn't want "to be too dramatic" with his comments about something that may not happen during his "working lifetime." But his comments,
published here in The Beat, about "a day--and maybe I am dreaming here--where those folks who are the intermediary between us and our customers have to pay for access to our product rather than us paying them to distribute our product" did not make friends in the travel agent community. Check out the
debate at Travel Weekly's site here.
On the day Chicago commissioned its first new runway since 1971 as part of a a $15 billion O'Hare Modernization Plan announced in 2001, the
Chicago Tribune reported that six major airlines have asked the city and the Federal Aviation Administration to "halt the next phase of the ambitious expansion project" that includes more new runways and a new terminal.
