Stella Moana & Company
To:
From:
Subject:
Date:
Cathy Mei, Managing Director
Bobbi McLin, Account Director
Switch to Hawaiian Airlines
October 5, 2010
This memo explains why Hawaiian Airlines should be the company’s primary airline for its
business trips to Hawaii. Hawaiian Airlines will save us more money than our current provider,
Continental Airlines. Hawaiian has recently received high honors as an overall carrier. The rest
of this memo will describe those honors, compare and contrast Hawaiian and Continental
Airlines, and explain the benefits Stella Moana & Company can have by switching to Hawaiian
Airlines.
Recent achievements by Hawaiian Airlines
Hawaiian Airlines has been well-recognized for its outstanding performances over the years.
According to its annual report for 2009, it ranked in the nation’s top spots among different
categories:
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#1 carrier for overall service quality and performance for the second time in three years
#1 on-time airline for its sixth consecutive year, with 94.7 percent of its flights arriving
as scheduled
#1 carrier for fewest flight cancellations, reporting only two cancellations out of 6, 392
flights
#2 carrier for fewest mishandled bags
Comparisons between Hawaiian and Continental
Hawaiian has lower fares than Continental. For example, Hawaiian’s prices for the month of
October averaged $299 for economy class. Continental’s economy class prices averaged $1273
for October. In addition, all of Hawaiian’s first-class fares are less than $1000. Continental’s
first-class fares average over $2000. Our company could potentially save close to $6000 a month
just by buying tickets with Hawaiian.
All of Hawaiian’s flights to Hawaii are nonstop. Continental only offers one direct flight to
Hawaii out of Los Angeles. The rest of Continental’s flights will take you as far as Houston,
Texas, and then from Houston to Honolulu. The total travel time for these flights is 16 hours.
Hawaiian’s flights have a travel time of six hours at most. Traveling for excessive hours can
poorly impact employees. We don’t want our employees to feel drained by the time they reach
their destination. Also, the wasted hours of traveling on Continental could be put to better use.
Our employees could use those hours to spend more time with clients, inquire about further
project developments, or even have a moment to experience Hawaii.
Hawaiian has excellent in-flight service. All of their flights serve breakfast, lunch or dinner, plus
snacks and soft drinks for free. Continental only serves snacks on their flights to Hawaii.
Hawaiian offers personalized in-flight entertainment systems called digE players. These are
portable devices that contain newly released movies, network television shows, music videos,
and audio channels. Continental just shows a movie on three different screens in the main cabin.
Our employees start working hard as soon as they arrive. I think it’d be nice to give them an
airline that provides food and entertainment before they land.
Benefits of Hawaiian
Hawaiian has Visa credit card programs available for businesses. These have an annual fee of
$50. Continental offers a similar MasterCard program, but for an annual fee of $395. While both
airlines let you earn one mile for every $1 spent on the credit cards, Hawaiian gives you the
chance to earn up to five. Hawaiian is partnered with over 250 stores, restaurants and hotels that
will give you up to five miles for every dollar spent at their business. By signing up for
Hawaiian’s Visa, we could use the miles to earn free flights, and even redeem awards for hotels,
cars, dining and shopping.
These “HawaiianMiles” aren’t only available through Hawaiian’s Visa card. We can take
advantage of these just by signing and setting up an account. These miles will allow us to
purchase roundtrips through not only Hawaiian Airlines, but also Delta Airlines, Continental
Airlines, and Virgin Atlantic. We could use them for a variety of hotels in Hawaii, all Marriott
hotels, and even some Las Vegas hotels that include $75 worth of gaming chips. Car rentals, gift
certificates to restaurants, and even rounds of golf are also examples of rewards that we can use
for ourselves or even our clients.
We make business trips to Hawaii 35+ times a year. Hawaiian offers a “Preferred Affiliate”
program to organizations that travel to Hawaii a minimum of 20 roundtrips per year. This
program would be perfect for us. Benefits of this program include:
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Exclusive access to discounted web fares
Validity for both business and leisure travel
Three HawaiianMiles for every dollar spent on HawaiianAir.com/Affiliate
Redeemable miles for flight awards on Hawaiian
Continental offers no such program for businesses that travel to consistent locations.
Conclusion
After reading this memo, I hope you will begin purchasing tickets from Hawaiian Airlines for
our business trips and look into the programs I mentioned. Below, I’ve listed how to apply or
sign up for them. If you have any questions or would like to discuss this further, please call my
office at ext. 1313.
Hawaiian Miles -- Go to HawaiianAir.com, click on ‘Manage’ at the top and then click on
HawaiianMiles. There is a ‘Join Now’ link you can click on that will take you to an enrollment
page that’s easy to fill out.
Hawaiian Airline’s Visa Signature Card – Go to HawaiianAir.com/ApplyVisa or call 1-800932-2775 and mention priority code UABG2H.
Preferred Affiliate Program – Call Hawaiian’s North America Passenger Sales at (414) 2938107 or email HawaiiSales@HawaiianAir.com for more information.
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