Comments on New Magazine & Question on Overweight Baggage Fee

From AboutUS Jan 20, 2006

US Airways launched a new inflight magazine in January, and as is the case with any work in progress, the airline has received both positive feedback and some ideas for improvement. Before sharing that feedback, however, how about some background on the magazine’s production?!

US Airways Magazine as a Revenue Producer

The new magazine, which combines the prior America West inflight magazine and US Airways former magazine, Attache’, is produced at no cost to the airline and actually provides a monthly revenue stream to the new US Airways. Greensboro-based Pace Communications publishes the magazine and is responsible for all advertising sales. Pace is responsible for selling enough space to cover the cost of producing the magazine on top of the revenue they commit to the airline each month. As a result of this risk, the publisher limits the amount of “non-adâ€￾ space (i.e. pages the airline authors) in the magazine. Since the non-revenue space itself must be further divided (between “marketingâ€￾ and “informationalâ€￾ content), space is at a premium. One significant spacesaving measure is to print content in one language; other features have been compressed for the same reason. But the payoff shows in the bottom line; balancing ad space with marketing and non-ad (feature) space has allowed the airline to increase its monthly revenue by over 200 percent.

US Airways Magazine to Entertain and Inform

But the magazine is more than a revenue generating publication. The inflight magazine serves as an entertainment option for customers and also is a resource for flight attendants by providing terminal map layouts, food/beverage service information and entertainment selections.

Now in Seatbacks:

Room for Improvement

Feedback has continually filtered in, so following are comments on the magazine, as well as the steps we are taking to resolve them or the rationale behind certain aspects of the magazine.

Feedback : "There's not enough employee content."
Response: Stay tuned for features authored by employees and more editorial focus on employees; aiming to implement in April 06.

"What about the translated content?"
Producing the magazine in one language was a necessary step in conserving space without losing content or revenue.

"The route maps are hard to read."
We're reworking the depiction of US Airways destinations vs. alliance cities to better emphasize our cities; will implement with March issue.

"The terminal maps are missing."
We're returning FRA to the maps section; will implement in March.

"The food/beverage section is confusing."
We're inserting clearer language in the March 06 issue; this issue will be solved permanently when catering is fully integrated.

"It's too 'Vegas-centric'."
LAS is a hot destination and advertisers know it; as a major revenue generator, LAS ads will remain. As we strengthen our brand, more diverse advertising opportunities will arise.

"What happened to the comment cards?"
Cards were cut as a cost-savings measure; however, we're looking into other ways to make comment cards available inflight.

Watch for continued improvement to our inflight magazine, and keep those comments coming!
 
I could care less who the advertisers in the magazine are as long as it improves the mag. Actually its fine, but the maps do need to be clearer and pleasant to look at. I also liked how AWA had a page with the ac types on it. I would like to see that as that is someting fun for the customer to see.

I would also like to see a "Did you know?" section about US. Because the maps are difficult to read, many don't realize where all we go..13 European destinations and growing....alot of Mexico, etc.

Just my thoughts.
 
The magazine is too Vegas Centric - and that is not a slam at the Vegas advertising, but a belief that USAirways now has difficulty with anything east of Phoenix. As an example New Your City and Orlando are both high impact destinations.
 
Feedback : "There's not enough employee content."
Response: Stay tuned for features authored by employees and more editorial focus on employees; aiming to implement in April 06.


Why should a magazine for customers have content for employees? :blink:
 
Why should a magazine for customers have content for employees? :blink:

Its not content FOR employees. Its by and about employees. They used to have a section about someone in the company and the job they do. It gave a brief description of the employee and what their job entailed. It was a way for the customers to get to know more about the different employee positions at the airline other than pilot and flight attendant.
 
Its not content FOR employees. Its by and about employees. They used to have a section about someone in the company and the job they do. It gave a brief description of the employee and what their job entailed. It was a way for the customers to get to know more about the different employee positions at the airline other than pilot and flight attendant.

Thanks for clearing that up.
 
The magazine is too Vegas Centric - and that is not a slam at the Vegas advertising, but a belief that USAirways now has difficulty with anything east of Phoenix. As an example New Your City and Orlando are both high impact destinations.

One word: money. Vegas pays money, and the Vegas advertising pays for the magazine.

We're very well aware of everything east of Phoenix. We just have a little trouble sometimes putting CLT and PHL in the right places on the map. And I personally don't know where New Your City is, but I do know that New YorK City is just south of Chicago, which is just east of Orlando. See, I told you we knew where this stuff was. Geez.
 
Im not in the mag biz, but I'd suspect that balancing ad space from feature space is a central feature of the task of editing and publishing. It's obvious that the look of the new U mag is MUCH less pleasing because of all of the ads. Perhaps if all the new ads were high art, concept ads selling mineral water or body lotion or high fashion it would look better (even though I've been annoyed by some high fashion ads I've seen lately- creepy sexy? no thanks).

PACE has done a great job over decades with the best looking in flight mag Ive ever seen. So, maybe they can clean up the look of some of the garish Vegas ads. At some point, you'd think that the advertisers themselves would realize that their ads are ugly and won't draw in business.

I don't know, I'm just personally sick of the crass, greedy, crude, obnoxious commercial culture. Vegasness is fine for Vegas, but does it have to follow me everywhere?
 
i think the new magazine should contain a spanish section like the Attaché did. we had a lot of spanish speaking customers with US East, and have a lot more with US West. I fly transatlantic and on the customs form information pages, it is only in Enlish. if you are foreign and don´t speak English, how are you going to understand these customs pages?
 
i think the new magazine should contain a spanish section like the Attaché did. we had a lot of spanish speaking customers with US East, and have a lot more with US West. I fly transatlantic and on the customs form information pages, it is only in Enlish. if you are foreign and don´t speak English, how are you going to understand these customs pages?

Andrew Dice Clay said in his routine, "They should have a sign up at the airport: Welcome to America. If you do not speak English get the fudge out of our country!"
 
Andrew Dice Clay said in his routine, "They should have a sign up at the airport: Welcome to America. If you do not speak English get the fudge out of our country!"
And we all know where Mr Clay is now...flipping burgers somewhere in the bowels of Long Island, no doubt. Learn something real quick, money is money, regardless of what language it is spoken in. ¿El dinero español no pasa tan fácilmente como americano?

There is no excuse for not producing one page in the back of the magazine that tells (at least) Spanish customers how to fill out an I-94.