(Warning…incoming rant) : )
I am now sitting on Richard’s plaid red and white puffy chair writing for the first time in ages and I thought I’d recount my journey door to door from Milan to London last week, simply because through the pain and agony of it, I think there are some design lessons to be learnt somewhere in there…
I left my full-of-stuff-that-wouldnt-fit-in-my -2-suitcases milan hotel room/apartment with the help of Victor and Tristam and after a very long and expensive cab ride to Centrale, I realised that the not so trusty Trenitalia website had indicated the wrong time to my plane on their online timetable. Victor has a ticket booked for that same day with Easyjet as well so we walked across the street to an internet café and exchanged tickets, names, departures, etc… so an expensive last minute flight became a really expensive, really last minute flight… ok so that wasn’t so bad considering that it would have been impossible to fathom such control over your flight less than 5 years ago…
So i wait with them for a shuttle bus to Linate, my new aiport destination (the first flight was leaving from Turin, silli yes, but less expensive), get there too early, wait forever as the checkin hasnt started… then get to the check-in. Of course to process 100 or so people there are only 2 people behind a booth. My limit on my luggage was exceeded and so I had to pay for extra luggage, but instead of actually doing that on the spot I had to go to Linate’s ticket booth. I leave my luggage in the care of a kind Australian whose husband had to run there too and line up for 15 mns at least, waiting for my turn to pay for my 10 kilos of excess luggage, thank god my flight wasnt leaving right there and then like some other people in line… Get to a booth eventually pay my fine, go back to the lovely woman retrieve my bags and check them in immediately (at least i didnt have to line up again).
That’s of course when I notice that the flight is actually 1h 30 mns late…arghhh can’t anything go wrong today! So i get through customs, getting the usual raised eyebrow for my passport picture (I had shaved Sinead-like hair at the time it was taken some 4 years ago, and yes a boyfriend too :P) and go get something to eat for the first time in about 6 hours. I then proceed to the gate, second passport check, then slump into a hot waiting room with 2 flights to London, ours from easy jet and the other one from Allitalia. I must have waited about an hour there and 2 flights from Allitalia took off during that time. I was really sleepy so didn’t really care at that point and dozed off on the uncomfortable plastic-moulded chair. The eventually the flight was called, and people lined up, (although i find that the Americans are better at lining up for things, in Europe, no one cares about that sort of thing) hot and tired already before even have set foot in the plane. A hot and sweaty bus after we pack into the plane, which was the first time that i went into a plan with a “first come first serve” attitude to the seating and no assigned numbers. It really felt like i was in a strange over-sized bus. I slept through most of it, as i had slept 3 hours only the night before, seeing Shawn and Alejandro off in the early morning. The Easyjet “flight attendants” were nice enough although at this point id call them waitresses…
Arrival at Gatwick eventually after a rather bumpy landing, you’d think they’d get the hang of these things, even the first ever flight from a pilot i had coming into Europe 2 years ago was smooth as cream… is that what you pay for? or that you don’t? I started to wonder what was so fabulous about low-cost airlines and if they weren’t actually missing a lot of opportunities in terms of services. As i visited the RCA show today (more on that in the next post) I saw something which made me think real hard about this issue. Apparently, Ryainair will gain so much money from in-flight gambling that they might come to a point where they might not have to charge at all for the flight… so in that case, will the services totally dissapear? will we get small vending machines next to the bathrooms to choose a sandwich from if we’re hungry? Nowadays I have to remember to bring a blanket and my headphones for a flight, but what about all the commercial posibilities of dealing with people who are tired, exhausted and would actually pay 3 pounds for a coffee? Could there not be the sale of zen-like products for the flight? Could you not order your food at the same time as your ticket and have it delivered to you as you check in? Would an association of cab and flight services be lucrative? “Come and get me with my heavy luggage for this and that flight and ill pay a little extra but will be much happier….”.
I believe that there truly are opportunities for low-cost companies to actually gain some market share by understanding people’s needs and how they are missing out on part of the market. At this point, people would rather pay a little more to be treated properly than with efficiency. That’s the real service economy, an economy where businesses understand the opportunities presented by their customers needs, and not business models whose only value is the low cost of the service. The day an airline company will provide customer-sensitive services, at a low price, the market will be seduced immediately… so in the meantime, ill book my flight for Amsterdam…ugh.