Issue 40: September/October 2009
EDITOR'S COMMENTS
IT IS NOT OFTEN THAT THE humble sandwich is exposed to the harsh glare of adverse publicity - at least, not since the days of British Rail - but British Airways' decision to take the questionable comestible off its short-haul menus has attracted a veritable welter of column inches.
Media types, usually better known for disparaging the inflight caterer's craft, leapt to the defence of the simple-but-British snack, xenophobically bemoaning its replacement by the alien pretzel.
British Airways argues that its catering cutbacks, including the so-called ‘sandwich ban', will save some £22 million a year and, although that is a drop in the financial ocean - the carrier's total operating costs last year came to £7.9 billion - every little helps.
Of course, BA is absolutely right. The availability of sandwiches, chilled to the point of tastelessness anyway, is not a major factor in passengers' choice of airline. The absence from the airline's menu of the bread'n'butter concoction is unlikely to spur a mass defection to lower-fare rivals, any more than Ryanair's swingeing £2.55 charge for a Batchelors Cup-a-Soup has proved a boon to the full-service fraternity. There is, however, a more serious side to the sandwich saga.
On the very day that BA's cheese-paring hit the headlines, Cadbury chief executive Todd Stitzer reported a 13 per cent jump in sales of Dairy Milk chocolate bars. "People want to indulge themselves," he said. "We are an attractive product in a difficult time."
If ever a simple truth deserved to earn mantra status, chanted in boardrooms and on shop-floors everywhere, surely that is it. To become "an attractive product in a difficult time" is a foolproof recipe for commercial success.
Travel suppliers certainly need to cut costs, but they need to do so without blurring the boundaries between ‘special' and ‘humdrum'. As Stitzer says, people want to indulge themselves.
Travel management companies, whose fees are coming under ever-closer scrutiny, need to keep a tight rein on the costs they pass on to their clients, but they also need to differentiate themselves from each other.
Within companies, travellers themselves need to be made to feel valued, particularly when they know full well that times are hard. The Premium Economy passenger is a lot happier than his counterpart even farther back, even if he (or she) is more accustomed to Business Class pampering.
To return, briefly, to the seat-back tray table. As well as scrapping sandwiches, British Airways is also replacing the second meal service in premium cabins with a ‘galley buffet'. It is obviously a cost-cutting measure, but BA - which has never been renowned for its PR expertise - adds that one in three ‘second service' meals went to waste, anyway.
That is absolutely not the point. If one has paid for afternoon tea, one is fully entitled not to eat it. The important thing is that the afternoon tea was there at all. Nobody in their right mind cans a self-booking tool on the basis that 30 per cent of employees don't use it, or tears up a travel policy because some travellers choose to ignore it.
In a recession, service provision has to be subject to the same cost controls as everything else, but differentiation is key.
In a land of cheese sandwiches, the bar of Dairy Milk is king.
Mike Toynbee, Editor
DESTINATION PROFILE
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The global economy has affected Asia like everywhere else, but a more personal business culture and a mighty aversion to failure means it is still standing tall, says Jonathan Hart
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