Regards, Ivan
Posted on 09/30/2004 1:15:29 AM PDT by MadIvan
FOR years it was a symbol of the cold, grey face Russia showed to the outside world, with cramped planes, a terrible safety record and frowning stewardesses.
But now the Russian airline Aeroflot insists it has changed its spots - with a little help from a British PR firm.
In a makeover of ambitious proportions, the airline has spruced up its planes, service and reliability, and insists the old service-with-a-scowl is a thing of the past.
The task was not an easy one. Until now, Aeroflot has had a well-deserved reputation as a Communist-era theme park with clunky planes that nobody trusted to stay in the air.
It is often said that an airline’s personality reflects its country - think Lufthansa’s lumbering German efficiency or Alitalia’s maddening Italian chaos.
Aeroflot’s fate is to track Russia’s many changes. Bright and hopeful at its formation in 1923, its stagnation began soon afterwards and gave the airline the reputation it has struggled to shake off.
In 1991 things got worse; the Soviet Union dissolved and so did the airline. Parts of it were hived off into smaller airlines, which were involved in a string of crashes.
Aeroflot pilots began taking cash from extra passengers, resulting in dangerous overloading. Other passengers told of being stranded in far-flung destinations until a whip-round raised money for fuel.
Then in 1994 came a stunning disaster; an Aeroflot Airbus, one of the first to enter service with the airline, was en route to Hong Kong from Moscow when, over the Siberian town of Novokuznetsk, the pilot decided to give his son a go at the controls.
The 16-year-old inadvertently knocked the auto-pilot off kilter and the airliner immediately began to roll.
The co-pilot had pushed his seat far back from the controls to give the pilot’s children space in the cockpit and in the seconds it took him to yank the seat forward, the plane had slid on to its side, dropped its nose and gone into a spin.
The co-pilot wrestled with the controls for two minutes and had almost flattened-out the dive when the plane hit the ground, killing all 75 on board.
Hot on the heels of safety fears came financial questions; the Russian tycoon Boris Berezovsky took charge of the airline, and executives were later accused of embezzling hundreds of millions of pounds of its foreign takings.
Berezovsky, wanted in Russia on fraud charges, fled Moscow and has been granted political asylum in the UK. Aeroflot seemed to be an airline going nowhere.
Enter the London image firm Identica this year, with what many would consider the impossible task of making Aeroflot loveable.
Identica’s chairman, Tom Austin, admits one hurdle was the "horrific" accidents of the early 1990s, but points out that the 1994 disaster was Aeroflot’s last major crash.
Russian airliners are not pretty, but in terms of ruggedness they measure up well to their western counterparts.
Aeroflot was originally intended by the Soviets to be a counterpart to the air force, with the planes equipped for dual use - some still have the bomb-aimers’ glass bubble in the nose.
The airframes are designed to cope with nearly twice the maximum stresses of western planes and with more careful maintenance the crashes have stopped, to the point where the airline is now among the world’s top five safest carriers.
Meanwhile, the cabins have had a makeover, the dowdy uniforms of the stewardesses have been given new flair and the concept of the smile was introduced.
"Stewardesses used to be very austere, authoritarian, and they certainly weren’t very friendly," Mr Austin said.
"But I think if you go on to any Aeroflot flight today, you will see a marked difference."
The first surprise about an Aeroflot flight is the plane itself. Gone, on international flights, are the old Soviet-era machines, junked in favour of modern Airbuses and Boeings.
The airline had no choice in this matter, because Europe and the United States have imposed tough new noise regulations that wiped the Soviet machines from the skies.
But the Russians have turned that to their advantage. The new planes are painted a sleek silver, with the Aeroflot logo in the Roman alphabet, not Cyrillic.
Inside, the old dowdy interiors, with their strange smells and hues, are a thing of the past - the planes now boast blue seats with orange headrests.
The grey inedible food has also had an upgrade, with smoked fish, salad and hot dishes on offer. Best of all, the coffee now tastes like coffee.
But for all the claims on the blue paper place mats stating: "Because we fly with soul," Aeroflot, it seems, still also flies with a frown.
Try as they might, not even slick image consultants can rid Aeroflot’s staff of their stern expressions. It sits there, heavy and unmoving, on the faces of the stewards and stewardesses, as gloomy as a Moscow winter sky.
"There’s been a reasonably determined effort to start them smiling, it does not always happen," said Paul Duffy, the Irish director of Moscow’s leading aviation consultancy. "They still have a bit of a way to go on it."
But the changes are more than skin deep. With the nation’s economy, if not its politics, now on an even keel, tough new managers have joined the airline.
They have slashed dozens of unprofitable routes, kept open from the days of the Soviet Union to former satellite countries.
Passenger numbers are up, the airline is now in the black and it harbours hopes of luring foreigners deep into the largest country in the world. This summer, Aeroflot squeezed into the top ten index of the world’s most profitable airlines, and Air France has begun talks about forming an alliance.
By contrast, many western airlines are mired in debt and a few teeter on bankruptcy.
Mr Duffy is impressed. "I fly Aeroflot 25 to 30 times a year and I have noticed a huge difference," he said.
Before getting too excited about the changes, it is worth bearing in mind that the old military planes still fly on internal flights, offering the same dowdy service.
The airline operates what Mr Duffy calls a "two-tier" service, efficient internationally, but SOA - Same Old Aeroflot - on the shuttle to Siberia.
And then there is the airline’s final destination: Moscow’s Sheremetyevo-2 airport is one of the world’s most inhospitable.
On arrival the feel-good factor of the flight is swiftly lost.
Inside this shabby terminal passengers are met by low, grime-caked ceilings, a lack of light bulbs, long queues at passport control and a frenzy of freelance taxi drivers demanding £50 for a lift to Moscow.
Still, this is hardly Aeroflot’s fault, and most airlines to Moscow dump their passengers at Sheremetyevo where, at least, visitors can get a whiff of how the old Soviet Union once was.
And in an era where branding makes everything look the same, the distinctive Aeroflot frown might be a valuable marketing tool.
If everything else runs well, the passengers might grow to love it.
Regards, Ivan
Ping!
Isn't Aeroflot the airline with the outside toilets? ;-)
The service on Russia's "ROSSIYA" airline was excellent from Moscow to Anapa. Thos e flights were on Tu-134 which appeared well-maintained. The service then was better than on U.S. airlines today.
hehehe....kinda cold and still no toilet paper? Do they still fly to the Arctic Circle? :))
I think most of the former employees from the old Soviet Aeroflot are now in charge of customer service at American and US Airways.
And many were "Party member since 1934".
I interpret that remark as a terrorist threat. Here, put you hands in these zip-tie handcuffs until we land.
Supposedly, The last words before the plane started its dive were the Pilot, yelling, "Don't touch that!!!" No Kidding!
LC
bump
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