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Simple Flying Aviation News Podcast
#291: United Airlines' New Flight Attendant Contract, Papa Johns' Free Pizza For Ex-Spirit Loyalty Members, & More
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Hello, I'm Channing Reed. Welcome to a brand new episode of the Simple Flying Podcast where we'll give you the lowdown on the latest from the world of commercial aviation. Here's what we have for you this week. Coming up today, United Airlines flight attendants ratified a new five year contract to find out just how much their base pay will be raised. Then Breeze Airways marking its birthday with a fully refreshed in flight menu. The drinks and snacks you'll be able to find on board. Summer just around the corner will tell you which airline expects it to be its busiest in its 100 year history. Those stories plus Spirit Airlines may be gone, but what about the loyalty points? How one pizza joint has rewarded those points. And finally, United Airlines restored a transatlantic connection that has been dark for seven years. But there's a catch. It's operated by a narrow body aircraft. Details are ahead. Now you know what's in store. Let's get on with the show and thanks for joining me this week. Hope everyone is doing well. Wherever you're listening to our podcast, we do have a lot of stories to get to for today's show. We'll begin with a major labor deal. It's now official at one of the country's largest airlines, United Airlines flight attendants voted today to ratify a new five year contract, one that delivers 31% average raises to base pay and ends nearly six years without a contractual wage. The association of Flight Attendants announced the results and more than 88% of eligible crew members cast ballots and the 82% of those voted in favor of the deal, a decisive mandate from United's roughly 30,000 flight attendants. Now the contract includes several significant wins for cabin crew, the addition of the 31% base pay increase. Flight attendants will now be paid during the boarding process. That's something that airlines had historically not compensated for. The contract also introduces what's called sipay, additional compensation during ground delays lasting more than two and a half hours. And all eligible crew members will share in a retroactive pay package valued at $741 million, covering wages lost during years of stalled negotiations. United's most senior flight attendants will also see a landmark pay milestone ahead. Crew members with at least 13 years of service are on track to earn more than by the end of the contract period in 2030. The road to this agreement was not a smooth one. United's flight attendant's contract first became eligible for renegotiation back in August of 2021. So that's almost five years ago. Negotiations stretched on for years and in the summer of 2025, flight attendants actually voted down an earlier tentative agreement that would have included 26% raises. At one point, crew members even authorized a strike. Though both sides continue negotiating through federal mediation, a new tentative deal was reached in late March, and voting concluded with a very different outcome. Obviously. Ken Diaz, the president of United's chapter of the association of Flight Attendants, called the vote a demonstration of the union's collective strength, saying the contract, quote, will immediately change the lives of United flight attendants, especially our thousands of new hires hired since the pandemic. The union also says the new agreement sets a new industry standard, making United flight attendants the highest paid cabin crew among US Carriers for the duration of the deal. United Airlines CEO Scott Kirby also welcomed the outcome, calling flight attendants, quote, the face of the airline and saying the company is, quote, lucky to have the best flight attendants in the world. The new contract takes effect May 31, just in time for the busy summer travel season. And this ratification makes United the last of the major US Carriers to finalize a post pandemic labor deal with its flight crews. The deal also comes as the airline ramps up at premium cabin expansion, adding new lie flat seats and elevated dining options, putting added focus on the in flight experience those cabin crews members will deliver. For passengers flying United this summer. That means better compensated crew boarding your next flight. And this is a great story because we have covered this here on Simple Flying over the years and how airlines really have been working to negotiate with those flight attendant unions on new contracts. And it does go to show that the pandemic did kind of, it represents kind of a change of scenery, a turn of the page, if you will, in terms of the morale of crew members. And a lot of people are surprised when they hear that for the longest time flight attendants weren't paid for the boarding process. And so it's one of those things that many unions and airlines have negotiated about. And I think that it's great they're working, they're welcoming passengers on board, and so they should be getting paid for that. And it's very good to see that United has finally come around to agreeing with that as well. And yes, I mean, with all of the premium amenities and expansions and things that the airline is working on, part of the in flight experience has to do with the crew, right? Did you have a great experience from the crew? Were they attentive? Were they lively? Were they adding to the whole experience of the flight? That is something that airlines take into account. Passengers also take that into account as well. We've heard those stories of passengers that are not pleased with the service from flight attendants. So this definitely could be a boost of the morale moving forward and very exciting to see that United has finally come around and now has a contract that is competitive with some of the other airlines in the US well, we're going to switch gears and talk about a low cost carrier or ultra low cost carrier that is budget airline raising a glass at 35,000ft Breeze Airways marking its fifth birthday this week with a fully refreshed in flight menu, one that brings a custom signature cocktail, celebrity backed spirits and a new complimentary coffee partner to the cabin. The headliner is a drink called the Island Breeze, a sparkling vodka cocktail blending orange liqueur, cranberry, passion fruit and sea salt. It was developed exclusively for the airline in partnership with craft cocktail company Straightaway Cocktails and goes on sale at $12 or two for 22 passengers and Breeze's premium Ascent cabin will get it free. Of course, the cocktail is not the only new pour. Breeze is also adding Archer Rose Wines, a luxury canned wine brand co owned by actress Elizabeth Banks, with options Pinot Grigio, Pinot Noir and Bubbly rose ranging from 11 to $12. And passengers looking for something stronger. The airline is stocking still gin by Dre and Snoop, a premium gin backed by the two wrap icons that's going to go for $10 a pour. On the non alcoholic side, all Breeze passengers will now receive complimentary Pete's Coffee, specifically the brand's off the grid Colombian blend at no charge on every flight. All right, let's talk about food. The food menu is also getting an overhaul. A new a la carte snacks include a cheese tray, veggie ramen, kettle chips, granola bakes and gummy candy that's the most priced between 5 and $10. The airline is also introducing two curated snack boxes at $12 each, a fun favorites box aimed at for power pack box with protein forward options for health conscious travelers. Passengers looking to bundle can also choose from four new combo deals. Options include a vacation starts now bundle liqueur plus drink plus a snack for $17 and a picnic on a plane pairing of wine and the cheese tray for $18. Sharing bundles and snacks box combos round out the lineup now. Breeze was founded in 2021 by JetBlue creator David Nealman, positioning itself as the low cost carrier with a premium feel. We did report just last week that the airline also just received its 50th Airbus A220 300 aircraft, yet another milestone there the airline has racked up a string of recent accolades, landing on Time's 100 most influential companies list this year and earning recogn from Fast Company Travel and Leisure and the Airline Passenger Experience Association. Now this menu refresh takes effect this week, as I mentioned, across Breeze's network. So if your next flight happens to be on a Breeze aircraft, the inflight bar just got a significant upgrade, I think, that's for sure. What do you like? Do you prefer alcohol on board or do you go for a non alcoholic beverage? Does it depend on where you're going or the time of day? Would love to hear from you on that. But I do think that this is a great, great celebration. Five years, especially for a startup airline, especially in this economy, very difficult, right? And to see that the airline is coming out on top is great there. And I will say I think $18 is a little pricey for an in flight meal or snack and drinks for that matter. I mean, again, alcohol is involved and alcohol is pricey, but I don't know, I don't know if I would pay all that on board. Again, you know, ultra low cost carrier, they're something that you would expect on board. But in terms of the Peet's Coffee, Peet's isn't necessarily my go to coffee brand, but I am a big coffee drinker and to see that that's free on board is good there. We've seen other airlines have coffee partnerships as well. Delta Air Lines has Starbucks. I think Alaska Airlines has the Seattle Coffee company and United Airlines has, I think it's, I think it's ILI coffee as well. So just another coffee partnership there. Good to see all of this. I have not tried Breeze Airways. I do need to go on there on board and check it out. And if you have been on Breeze, feel free to let us know what your experience was like. But again, very exciting news here as the airline celebrates its fifth birthday. Well, if you have a summer flight booked, you may be in good company, or a lot of good company for that matter. American Airlines says this summer will be the busiest in its 100 years history, projecting a record breaking 75 million passengers across 750,000 flights between Memorial Day and Labor Day. But there's a significant catch. It could hit your wallet before you even get to the airport. American summer travel window runs from May 21 through September 8. Those projected numbers would shatter the airline's previous record set back in 2019, before the pandemic reshuffled everything about how Americans travel. Now the season kicks off with Memorial Day weekend, and the single busiest day is expected to be Friday, May 22, and more than 4.2 million passengers are projected to take the skies on roughly 40,000 flights nationwide. That works out to about five flights taking off every minute throughout the day. The demand picture does look strong. The cost picture is considerably murkier that surging jet fuel prices, driven in part by geopolitical tensions in the Middle east, which we have been reporting on now for weeks, are putting serious financial pressure on the carriers heading into the peak season. American's fuel bill jumped more than 13% in the first quarter alone compared to last year. The airline has warned that if fuel prices hold at current levels, the total hit to its annual fuel costs could exceed $4 billion this year. And here's the exposure. American currently holds zero fuel hedging contracts, meaning every swing in oil prices hits the books directly. The company has already trimmed its full year profit outlook, warning of a possible net loss at the low end of its projections for passengers. This squeeze is already showing up in ticket prices, and industry leaders say it could get worse. United Airlines CEO Scott Kirby has warned that fares this summer could run 15 to 20% higher than last year. American Air itself has already raised checked bag fees in recent weeks to help offset the rising costs. The industry is trying to recover only a portion of the added cost through fare increases and schedule adjustments. But analysts say some cheap fare buckets may simply disappear as the summer peak approaches and also as Spirit Airlines is no longer here. And how that ultra low cost carrier was really playing a big part in keeping those fares lower for the legacy carriers. Now, despite the financial headwinds, American says it has spent the off season preparing for the influx of passengers. The airline has already overhauled its schedule at the largest hub, which of course is Dallas Fort Worth International Airport, implementing a new structure that has already cut delays, reduced missed connections and delivered what the airline calls record baggage performance in Philadelphia, its main transatlantic gateway. A redesigned afternoon departure block is intended to ease congestion on international routes. American also led all major U.S. carriers in block time performance in April, meaning more flights arrived within their scheduled windows than at any other competing airline. Now the airline is also expanding its international footprint. This summer, new transatlantic routes include Philadelphia to Budapest and Prague, as well as new service from Dallas Fort Worth to Athens, Athens and Zurich and a new Miami route. And we did report also Americans started service to Venezuela after I believe it was a six year hiatus. So there is some new service, international service out of Miami as well. American's chief operating officer said the airline's more than 130 team members have built an operation that is reliable and resilient and ready for the summer peak. Now the pressure from fuel cost is being felt across the industry. Spirit Airlines, as I just mentioned, the ultra low cost carrier shut down earlier, just a few weeks ago, actually at the beginning of the month, partly due to the financial squeeze that budget carriers are least equipped to absorb. The bottom line for travelers this summer, planes will be full, fares will likely be higher, and booking early remains the best defense against a season that is shaping up to test the limits of the ENT national air travel system. That could not be more true. I was just looking at prices even already for Thanksgiving later this year just to travel over to the east coast to visit some family and the prices were very surprising to me. That's just domestically. You look into what an international itinerary will look like and those prices I'm sure are just have skyrocketed. Especially if you want a premium experience. I'm sure any lie flat offering is going to cost you over $2,000 at least depending on the destination where you're going. It is very interesting to see that American, they're staying optimistic, things are going to hopefully go in a better direction. But the way that things are right now, fuel prices and operating costs and things like that, we're just seeing a lot of consumer impact there on the Wal and we will just hope that those prices will go down. But I've been definitely following the aftermath of the Spirit Airlines shutdown. That's one of the things that a lot of industry analysts are saying is Spirit was there, played a huge part in those lower fares and also even the bundles. We have all three legacy airlines, they have their version of basic economy now which was something that didn't ever exist. But those ultra low cost carriers did a great job at influencing the legacy and full service carriers to really bring those prices down so that they can maintain that competition now with one less airline in the space and in the sky. It's kind of a reason for the legacy carriers to not have those fares as low as they once did. So you have that and then you also have the fuel prices as well. It's just a recipe for skyrocketing airfares. So hopefully they will come down throughout the summer. But good to see that American again staying optimistic with other airlines too. Well, I just mentioned Spirit Airlines and so one of the stories that I wanted to cover was a very interesting one. Now obviously just mentioned the carrier has ceased operations. It no longer exists, unfortunately. But believe it or not, a pizza chain has offered something in return for some passengers. Papa John's has launched a promotion called Skies to Pies turning the useless loyalty points of some of Spirit's most frequent flyers into something that those former travelers can actually use, which is free pizza. So here's how it works and I should mention this is likely over. I'll get into the details, but it is still worth noting and it's definitely a good act by Papa John. So former Spirit Loyalty members directly direct message Papa John's on Instagram with proof of their Spirit membership status along with a screenshot of their Papa Rewards account. Now, once that's Verified, the first 250 people receive a promo code for a free large one topping pizza. It's not subject to any blackout dates, no middle seats, just in the company's own words, better ingredients, better pizza. Now, now there is a catch that is worth noting. The promotion was capped at just 250 participants, a number of course, given the tens of thousands of former Spirit Loyalty members left holding worthless points. Some people have drawn some criticism. It's raised some eyebrows about why it's only 250 participants. But Papa John's senior vice president of brand marketing acknowledged the limits of the gesture, saying the chain can't fix canceled flights or restore lost points, but said the company hopes to offer a smile and a delicious pizza to those impacted. As we have covered, Spirit Airlines that ceased its operations earlier this month, leaving passengers with stranded bookings, unusable frequent flyer miles and really no clear path to compensation, as well as with the crew members and employees 17,000 people out of a job. The Sky Supplies campaign comes as Papa John's reported a 3% dip in global system wide sales in its first quarter, making making the marketing splash a timely move for the brand looking to win back attention. Whether it amounts to meaningful goodwill or mostly clever marketing may depend on which side of those 250 spots you land on. I can imagine that story came out last week, so it's likely that 250 people have already maybe eaten all of their free pizza at this point. But still, nonetheless, a very, very good story. It is worth noting too that United Airline saw on Twitter they responded to a passenger saying it was kind of out of satire, but there was one passenger that was kind of joking about maybe being able to transfer the Spirit Loyalty points to a United Airlines flight and United responded saying no, that's not a thing. Essentially. So kind of interesting to see that Papa John's on the other hand is saying, hey, yeah, we'll take your used to Spirit loyalty points and you can use it for a free pizza. So good news there, especially in a time that is not so great for passengers and employees alike. As I had mentioned, we did also cover a story about how one of those aircraft transport companies are working to obviously get these spirit planes out of the airports and into storage and essentially at the boneyards in Arizona. And the main leader of that company was talking about how, how they really want to hire spirit pilots to transport those aircraft and get some money in their pocket. Because right now you can only imagine a lot of these people out of a job. How are you going to put food on the table? How are you going to pay for your rent if you have a family to provide for? So there's a lot of questions, there's a lot of stress. And he really described it as death in the family or something. That's really tragic to see a little bit of good news out of this is wonderful. And to all of the Spirit passengers as well as Spirit employees, if you're listening to this podcast here at Simplifying, we do wish you all of the best and hope that another opportunity will be on the horizon. Again, just a very tragic situation here. Hopefully things will get better with how things are going. But good to see again that Papa John's is offering that free pizza. Who knows, maybe it'll happen again or another company will do it for that matter. And maybe we can focus on the employees that were impacted. We're going to go to across the Atlantic now, where a major US Airline has restored a transatlantic connection that had been dark for seven years. United Airlines launched its first nonstop flights between Glasgow, Scotland and Newark, New York, New Jersey, but serving the New York metropolitan area. That route started last week, making it the only American carrier currently offering direct service between Glasgow and the United States. The service is seasonal running daily through October 24 and is operated aboard a Boeing 737 Max 8, the United's first narrow body deployment on a transatlantic route to the United Kingdom. The aircraft carries 166 seats across three cabins, first class, economy plus and standard economy. Westbound flights depart Glasgow in the early afternoon, arriving in Newark by mid afternoon local time in time to connect onward across United's domestic network. Now, United last served Glasgow back in 2019 before the pandemic forced the route suspension and the years since passengers in western Scotland wanting to fly directly to the US had no scheduled option. They were forced to connect through London, Dublin or other European Hubs adding hours to their journeys. The revival ends that gap entirely and positions Newark as a single stop gateway to over 220offward destinations across north and South America. The new Glasgow route is part of a broader summer expansion for United, which this year is serving 44 transatlantic destinations and operating close to 770 weekly round trips across the Atlantic. Other new nonstop routes launching from Newark this summer include Split in Croatia, Bari in Italy and Santiago de Compostela in Spain. Combined with its existing Edinburgh services, United now operates up to four daily nonstop flights between Scotland and the United States, more than any other carrier in the market. So good news there. And yeah, again, when you look at it, you think transatlantic, you think widebody. I guess they also did they operate the 757 on transatlantic routes, but the aircraft that would not necessarily come to your mind, or maybe I'm just speaking for myself, would be the 737 Max 8. So great to see there. I did see on social media media that someone was saying that no lie flat seats of course on this flight and I think that's kind of what you would associate a widebody with. But also United 757s I believe that they would deploy on a transatlantic routes did have Polaris lie flat seats. So this will be a true first class domestic product on a transatlantic route with a 737 Max 8. But I know that this is not the first transatlantic route for the 737 Max that United has started. As I mentioned, they have other routes. I believe Portugal was one of those other destinations that the Max also flies on. So it goes to show you that with these narrow body aircraft that have a larger range, we could be seeing more of this occur where you don't really have lie flat seats on a long overseas routes. I mean we're already seeing it on the Trans Pacific side. Down to Hawaii there are only a few carriers that operate widebody flights from Southern California, truly down to the Hawaiian Islands. Over the years those widebodies have been replaced with Narrow body aircraft, A321neo as well as the 737 Max. So it is definitely a change of the times in the industry, but now nonetheless great that the United has reinstated this route after a hiatus and I'm sure that we'll be able to see more routes coming on board again with these new aircraft and new services and new products as well. Well that's going to do it for this week's podcast. We hope you enjoyed it and we welcome any feedback that you might have@editorialimpleflying.com for more great content. You can visit our website@simplifying.com or find us on social media. Simply search for simple flying. And if you enjoyed this podcast, please leave us a rating on your favorite podcast player. Thanks for listening.