SPENDERS AND PENNY-PINCHERS

While waiting at a bar counter the other day for the round of drinks I had just ordered, one thought occurred to me. There are two types of people in this world: the spenders and the cheapskates (or, a term I absolutely adore, “penny-pinchers”). While reading these lines, I assume you’ll figure out in which category you fit easily: either you are the guy that sits at the table, enjoying some free rounds, or you are the one going to the counter ordering one more round for all.

So, what does this all have to do with airlines?

Airlines love to upsell: ancillaries, upgrades… anything, really. Following the previous paragraph, you may already guess what category of people goes for these upsells. Nowadays, people often travel with others as a group, with each person or couple having their own booking. This means that airlines only target spenders, providing them with upsell options for their own reservations.

What if you could allow a spender to spend money on ancillaries and upgrades for the whole group?

Let us call this concept “dynamic group”. The airline would give the possibility for its customers to indicate that they are travelling together, giving each other the right to upsell their bookings. Everyone in a dynamic group gets to “buy a round”: this could be lounge access for all, priority boarding, meals, WiFi, or even a class upgrade. All these upsells that “penny-pinchers” would never have paid for are now sold to the “spender” in their group.

RE-THINKING ANCILLARIES

Another important aspect of this upselling is for the airline to be able to sell an experience, rather than only the ancillary. For instance, instead of selling seats, airlines would be able to offer a “sit together” ancillary, ensuring that the whole group gets seats in close proximity.

In that same theme, we can imagine “sharing a bottle”, and “play games together”. While these simply mean “buy X glasses of red wine” or “buy WiFi”, they ultimately are presented in a different, more meaningful package.

Note that these “ancillaries with meaning” do not require dynamic groups, and could also be presented to solo travellers. For instance, while I wouldn’t pay specifically to have a window seat, I could be enticed to get a “seat with a view of Mount Fuji”. Optimally, this may be tied to a motivation scheme that ties me to the airline’s frequent flyer programme, for example by offering me miles if the view is then obstructed by bad weather.

ORDERS: THE KEY TO DYNAMIC GROUPS

With Order Management Systems becoming a reality for airlines, the new capabilities associated with orders are interesting. These dynamic groups could easily be implemented, with a simple inclusion in the order structure of the list of other orders, that have the rights of either consultation (read), or even update (write) for that booking.

Filling in those read/write rights would come from various possible customer flows. Either the customer itself indicates it manually, or it could be automated during order creation. Lastly, the travel agency, upon creating several bookings for the group, could indicate those automatically.

Ancillary sales and ticket upgrades are just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to dynamic groups. These could also improve the customer experience by allowing travellers to get informed of any relevant update on their friend’s bookings. Or even upon involuntary changes, allowing the airline to ensure the group is reseated together or even rebooked together, further increasing customer satisfaction.

Overall, dynamic groups are an innovative feature which would benefit airlines and customers. I would appreciate being able to travel with my friends, with the airline acknowledging that we travel together. And I look forward to being able to buy a round of lounge access. 

Thibaud Rohmer, Travel in Motion AG

 

It began, like many discussions in our family, during a joint family dinner. One of my sons, then still a teenager, politically very active and vocal (maybe not for the right side, in his father’s opinion!) announced to all of us that he will never fly again – because of global warming and the contribution aviation makes to it. As an experienced father of three I immediately decided not to enter into a discussion, simply because his siblings would take side with him against their parents, so instead I proposed to look at the facts.

The facts are of course that civil aviation does indeed contribute to global warming – what doesn’t? McKinsey, among numerous others, has recently published an article about decarbonizing aviation that provides an excellent introduction to the subject. It is summarized that pre-pandemic about 2.5% of the total global CO₂ emissions were caused by aviation. Therefore, I think it is fair to state that our industry is not the main problem, although we all are fully aware that every ton of CO₂ counts and that the predicted growth of air traffic will further increase the need to act. It is also necessary to mention that recent research work sees that non-CO₂ effects should not be underestimated in this context, but this research work is still in a nascent stage.

As a result of the increasing need to take action, the aviation industry has committed to become net-zero by 2050. Numerous activities need to contribute to achieving this target, such as more efficient fleets on numerous levels, from better operations and individual flight planning to common airspace control, sustainable aviation fuels (SAF) and carbon offsetting. McKinsey estimates that a fuel efficiency improvement of 39% has been achieved between 2005 and 2019, and McKinsey’s work further quantifies each of the aforementioned activities in relation to a projected global 2030 view.

All that said, in my view two facts need to be highlighted:

• net-zero aviation cannot be achieved immediately, especially as a lot of the described activities take time to be implemented, such as fleet renewals or moving to a Single European Sky (we don’t even have a single European power plug yet, by the way!)
• it will lead to higher ticket prices for the passengers.

Still, we can already act now, mainly by offsetting CO₂ emissions and further pushing for SAF. Many airlines have taken action and offer CO₂ neutral flights. In some cases, CO₂ neutral flights are offered by airlines as a special fare family or product bundle. For instance, the Lufthansa Group offers “green fares” for all intra-European flights, with the fare uplift covering 20% CO₂ reduction through the usage of SAF and 80% of CO₂ reduction by offsetting. This offer is currently not available for intercontinental flights, although this is most likely just a matter of time, either for LHG or others. Indeed, many other airlines also offer CO₂ neutrality as an optional ancillary product available to purchase, very often based purely on CO₂ offsetting.

Both ways of reducing CO₂ (SAF and offsetting) can be integrated and embedded into distribution processes with relative ease. Third-party service providers such as Berlin-based start-up Sqake offer highly sophisticated and automated tools to exactly calculate the amount of CO₂ emitted by travel on a specific route and cabin class, as well as executing the CO₂ neutrality through SAF, climate projects on behalf of the airlines or a mixture of both. Assuming that airlines will not revenue manage the price of CO₂ neutrality, a cost-based price can be provided to the traveller. And even if the airline is not able to provide such seamless methods as special fare brands or ancillary services, travellers can still compensate emissions by offsetting these through stand-alone methods such as those provided by companies or foundations like Switzerland-based myclimate.org.

In essence, reaching CO₂ neutrality when flying is already possible today, either through a service, provided by the airline or by offsetting through independent providers (although not all CO₂ offsetting projects are equal and attention should be paid to where contributions really go!). But reaching CO₂ neutrality comes at a cost, and in the end travellers will have to cover them, either directly or indirectly. And this point is where I see the paradox. While 56% of travellers worry about climate change, less than 3% of them currently travel CO₂-neutral. Or in other words, most travellers recognise the problem and the mechanisms to achieve individual travel that is CO₂-neutral are available, but very few really “walk the walk.” Therefore, blaming (or even financially punishing) airlines for CO₂ emissions is not very helpful as long as travellers are not willing to cover the additional efforts of the airlines in the form of higher ticket prices.

It was again during one of our family dinners where spoke about our travel plans for 2024. After taking trains and ferries for the last couple of vacations, all family members are back to flying – although this is not necessarily a contradiction to the dinner conversation mentioned at the beginning of this blog. It is about flying in a responsible way by also compensating for our leisure travel. Travellers can already help our industry to accelerate the journey to achieving CO₂ neutrality and (if they travel on business) also help their companies reach their ESG targets. More and more companies have committed to reaching ESG targets and CO₂ reduction down to CO₂ neutrality is a key pillar. Thus, we see growing demand for CO₂ neutral flight products and airlines need to find ways to offer and to deliver them. NDC could also act here as an enabler, if all parts of the distribution chain agree to support this.

Of course, CO₂ offset does not equal CO₂ prevention, but every little helps, and it is a big step forward. Travel in Motion has compensated all of our air travel for many years, and when we entered into our strategic partnership with Oystin Advisory our wish that they also start compensating was immediately accepted. We now strive to become a CO₂-neutral company, and soon hope to be able to offset all emissions from heating the home office, hotel stays and public transport to the cups of coffee we drink and meals we take.

 

Boris Padovan, Travel in Motion AG

This blog was published jointly with Terrapinn.