Interesting approach by AC. Given their assumption that on red eye flights passengers just want to sleep, I wonder if they had a little meeting one day to work out that the best way to help passengers sleep would be to not serve food. (after all it is very rude wanting to serve us food while we try to sleep) It must have been a very difficult decision to decide between that and increasing seat pitch (the other obvious service improvement they must clearly have considered). (Completely tongue in cheek of course) Dave (MEL) ----- Original Message ----- From: "Mark Greenwood" <mgreenwood@xxxxxxxxx> To: <AIRLINE@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> Sent: Sunday, August 24, 2003 4:19 PM Subject: Air Canada Puts The Squeeze on Lemons > Are there people who would be willing to pay a premium not to be nickle and > dimed on a flight? AC is even charging for booze now on international > flights. > > > I am so proud of being Canadian...And so proud of flying Air > Canada...What an airline...I'm actually crying right now... > > Oddly Enough - UK Reuters > Fri Aug 22, 3:05 PM ET > > MONTREAL (Reuters) - Air Canada, which axed thousand of > jobs and grounded dozens of planes in its struggle to stay aloft, > has declared war on lemons, limes and fruit juice to squeeze > out a few more dollars in revenues. > > An internal memo said the airline, Canada's largest and the > world number 11, has already saved C$100,000 (45,000 > pounds) by halving the number of lemon and lime slices on its > flights, and bread, chips and chocolate bars were also under the > spotlight. > > "There are a lot of other areas we are taking a closer look at > such as reducing meals on 'red eye' flights, where some > passengers just want to sleep," Air Canada's onboard > provisions analyst Jeannie Que, said in an employee newsletter > posted on an Air Canada web site. > > "We're also taking a closer look at orange juice, bread, chips, > chocolate bars, coffee and bottled water... It's the little things that > make a big difference." > > Air Canada has been racing to cut its costs since it filed for > bankruptcy protection in April, when its losses peaked at some > C$5 million a day. > > The airline is already asking passengers to pay for food on > shorter flights and it said it expected to save million of dollars by > restructuring its in-flight food trolleys. > > The last few weeks have been dismal for the airline, which > started to lay off employees just as the summer travel rush > started, prompting long check-in lines and angry passengers. > > Flight delays and airport chaos increased last week when a the > big blackout in North America shut down its operations for a day, > and this week a computer virus crippled its reservation systems. > > > --- > Outgoing mail is certified Virus Free. > Checked by AVG anti-virus system (http://www.grisoft.com). > Version: 6.0.509 / Virus Database: 306 - Release Date: 12/08/2003 >