29 March 2012 – “Technology can be offered as a perk, for example providing passengers in Business with free tablets,” Raymond Kollau says. 
22 March 2012 – “Passengers can look forward to a far more personalized experience in the future,” says airlinetrends.com’s Raymond Kollau. 
3 Feb. 2012 – “The concept makes perfect sense as people like to surround themselves with like-minded persons,” said Raymond Kollau. 
24 July 2011 – No major U.S. carrier offers free food on domestic flights anymore, says Raymond Kollau. 
4 May 2011 – “This is an example of experiential marketing,” Raymond Kollau said. 
10 March 2011 – “This is a novel way to pass some of the risk in fuel cost to customers,” Raymond Kollau said. 
Airport vehicles go green
15 April 2010 | Many airlines and airports already try to reduce energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions from operations on the ground where possible. JetBlue, Air France-KLM and Amsterdam Schiphol Airport are taking another step by introducing non-CO2 emitting ground vehicles.
JetBlue says it has just purchased a new environmentally-friendly utility truck for use by its technical operations team at New York’s JFK airport. The MILES electric work truck’s maximum speed is 25 miles an hour and travels 50-60 miles (80-95 km) on a charge. JetBlue says it plans to purchase additional vehicles to reduce its carbon footprint and consumption of fuel.
Air France-KLM is currently testing the ‘AirPod’, a zero-emission vehicle that runs on compressed air. The carriers are using seven of the vehicles at Charles De Gaulle Airport in Paris and Schiphol Airport in Amsterdam to transport people and light cargo. The 2 meter (6 feet)-long fiberglass-and-foam bodied AirPod can carry three people and weighs roughly 220 kilos (450 pounds). Its air tank holds 175 liters of compressed air, enough to give the AirPod a range of over 200 km (135 miles) and a top speed of 70 km an hour (43 mph). KLM says it is using the AirPod to reduce CO2 emissions for ground operations whereit is currently using traditional cars and trucks that run on diesel.
Since May 2009, Amsterdam Schiphol Airport has been testing a Th!nk City electric city car. The car is availabe for use by the Schiphol office employees to go around the airport, and can be recharged at a dedicated power outlet outside the airport’s head office. The pilot runs until mid-2010, and based on the outcome Schiphol may purchase more electric vehicles. In 2008, Schiphol also purchased a number of electric scooters for use on the airport and 10 percent of its vehicle fleet runs on biodiesel. The airport is working to turn its own operations climate neutral by 2012.
Finally, San Francisco Airport, which is one of the airports around the world with the most active green policies, already operates 25 small electric utility vehicles for low-speed on-airport needs.
About Raymond KollauFounder of airlinetrends.com. Spends his day monitoring the global aviation industry for commercial innovations in response to changing consumer behaviour. Besides working with clients in the airline industry, Raymond also has a part-time position as consumer trends analyst at leading consumer trends agency trendwatching.com.
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