Posted On: Monday - April 16th 2018 5:31PM MST
In Topics: Political Correctness Economics Big-Biz Stupidity
(continued from this post)
Now, let me discuss the last part, the CEOs who should shut their mouths more. The guy I ran into a few days back was a very high-frequency passenger on Delta Airlines. These days the big airlines, and especially Delta, have a tendency to really kiss the asses of their "Gold", "Emerald" or whatever precious metal/mineral-based customers are tops. They have their good reasons - that these are the customers that pay the real money-making fares and they are the only customers who have any loyalty. The twice-a-year vacationers may get treated very well on a flight, but if one finds a $20 lower fare next year on a different airline, he is likely going to bail for that. The internet has made this worse, I think.
This particular gentleman was fairly and rightfully pissed off about Delta's (and United's too, BTW) scrapping of their NRA discounts about a month back. The funny thing is, I had read that it wasn't more than a few dozen people out of millions that had availed themselves of it. The head honchos of Delta had to jump into the political fray after the Florida school shooting, and bad-mouth the NRA. Maybe they figured jerking the discount would only bother that score or so of customers, but see, it's the talk that pissed lots of people off. Because another of the 3 huge airlines left in the US did this same move, I really doubt that a boycott would be of any use. People may talk, but the high-dollar loyal passengers will stick with their status and perks, and the low-dollar ones will still shop the lowest fare that gets them from here to there and back.
However, a strongly worded letter by one, or maybe many, of the passengers that Delta kisses the asses of may make a difference in how much the CEO will mouth off next time. The immediate damage to Delta's bottom line this time was due to the outrage by the good gun-appreciating folks in the government of Georgia. Hey, Peak Stupidity does not praise government very often, so take a shot. We won't get you drunk on this one. Anyway, the ironic part here was that the buddy-buddy (bills-of-attainder notwithstanding anymore) deal of an exemption of fuel taxes at Atlanta Hartsfield since Delta's operation there is BIG BIZ, had apparently expired already. Therefore, the tax could be implemented again with no law required, just "hey, how 'bout this? We just noticed ...." Heckuva job,
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