PaxEx.Aero

The Business of Passenger Experience

New livery, free drinks, free wifi coming to Aer Lingus in 2019

By Leave a Comment

Aer Lingus is poised to launch a new livery and uniforms in Q1 2019 as part of a brand update. The new look will launch on the company’s A321neo fleet and come with improvements to the economy class product – free drinks and wifi – as well. CEO Stephen Kavanagh revealed these changes at APEX EXPO this morning as part of the carrier’s goal to continue its growth across the Transatlantic as the leading “value carrier” in the market.

Kavanagh’s presentation focused on the company’s efforts to improve Net Promoter Score through smarter investments, using the passenger satisfaction score to inform the company’s decisions on where to invest. “We are driven by NPS and it allows us to reduce costs in areas where the NPS is not relevant or the guest dissatisfaction is of a minor nature. Difficult decisions need to still be made, but at least they are informed decisions.” With that data the carrier improved the IFE screens and headsets ($0.50 extra per headphones spend drove a 9 point NPS bump). Going forward it means free drinks on board, too. The carrier will introduce complimentary wine and beer during meal service as part of the service improvements.

On the wifi front Aer Lingus currently offers passengers in business class a voucher for 400MB of data as part of their ticket. Starting in Q1 ’19 passengers in economy class will receive 20MB of service free on board. Megabyte packages are notoriously difficult for consumers to understand and manage. Still, a complimentary option on board is rare in the market, especially in long-haul markets. Even as a limited offering this is a smart offering in the marker.

The strong focus on NPS to drive investment decisions can create some challenges for the airline in terms of passenger perception. Kavanagh highlighted the airline’s decision to stop cleaning planes at every turn as one such paradox. Passengers want clean planes, of course. But they also want on-time flights. Aer Lingus made the choice to skip the 10-15 minutes of cleaning unless crew explicitly request that. Kavanagh’s reasoning is clear:

If we’re going to focus on on-time performance we’re going to stop cleaning except on demand. The value of on-time performance greatly outweighed the passenger satisfaction of the cleaning. We simplified our operation, cut costs which we passed on and hit top 10 in global on-time performance.

Other changes will also be driven by data collected through passenger surveys. Kavanagh knows that the industry is not static and the airline cannot be either. The company collects 10,000 surveys from passengers each month and those numbers will largely decide the future of the airline.

More from APEX EXPO 2018

A favor to ask while you're here...

Did you enjoy the content? Or learn something useful? Or generally just think this is the type of story you'd like to see more of? Consider supporting the site through a donation (any amount helps). It helps keep me independent and avoiding the credit card schlock.

Like what you're reading? Subscribe to PaxExTRA for a weekly update on the Passenger Experience industry.

About Seth Miller

Seth Miller has over a decade of experience covering the airline industry. With a strong focus on passenger experience, Seth also has deep knowledge of inflight connectivity and loyalty programs. He is widely respected as an unbiased commentator on the aviation industry.

He is frequently consulted on innovations in passenger experience by airlines and technology providers.

You can connect with Seth via email, on Twitter, Instagram, and LinkedIn.

Reader Interactions

Leave a Reply

Subscribe to PaxExTRA

 

Start your week off with an update on the top passenger experience news. Sign up now!

You have Successfully Subscribed!