Lufthansa Pilot Strike Is a Bad Start to Holiday Travel Season — Skift Business Traveler

What to Know Now

Welcome to holiday season (known to business travelers as upgrade season). For most in the U.S., this year’s Thanksgiving travel went smoothly with one notable exception: those flying in Europe on Lufthansa.

Pilots at the German carrier went on strike over the weekend, cancelling thousands of mostly intra-European flights and snarling traffic throughout the continent. Now that strike has been extended into this week.

As one could probably guess, the issue revolves around pilot pay and a long-expired contract between the workers and management. So far however, neither side has moved, so if you have upcoming travel on Lufthansa it may be disrupted.

On the bright side, your upgrade may clear.

Social Quote of the Day

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Maybe the pilots have overplayed their hand if management hasn’t moved from their starting position at this point.

– Donna @ OMAAT

Airlines

Interview: IAG CEO on Protectionism, Low-Cost Competition, and Passenger Experience: Walsh, now CEO of International Airlines Group, the European company that owns British Airways, Aer Lingus, Iberia, and the Spanish low cost airline, Vueling, remains unafraid to make decisions unpopular with unions and passengers, so long as they make sound financial sense. Airlines, he has said, must adapt, or they will die. Read more at Skift

Airbus’ Biggest A350 Jet Makes Its First Flight: The biggest version of Airbus Group SE’s A350 wide-body jet made its first flight Thursday, swelling the twin-engine model’s capacity as the four-turbine Boeing Co. 747 and the European manufacturer’s own A380 superjumbo struggle to find buyers. Read more at Skift

How Revenue-Based Loyalty Programs Changed the Way I Earn Points: As billed, airlines originally suggested that revenue-based programs would be equal-to if not better than distance-based programs. So to see whether the new program lived up to its hype this week, I took a look at my mileage earnings from before and after the transition. The results were disappointing. Read more at Skift

Airports

50 U.S. Airports Tack on $183 Million for Taxi Rides Home: Ever feel like the taxi ride from the airport costs more than the trip there? It’s not your imagination. Read more at Skift

BA boss shocked to find out that third Heathrow runway will raze his HQ: The boss of Heathrow’s biggest customer, British Airways, only discovered that building the airport’s planned third runway would require the demolition of his airline’s head office after looking at a map. Read more at The Guardian

Lufthansa’s Pilots Say They’re Open to Talks After Four Days of Strikes: German pilots union VC said on Sunday it was open to further talks with Lufthansa to try to find a compromise over a long-running pay dispute that caused a four-day strike last week, adding the airline needed to present a new offer. Read more at Skift

Tech

Video: Lola CEO Paul English Says Innovation Comes in Small Teams: When it comes to innovation, little things mean the most. That’s the view of Paul English, co-founder and CEO of travel agency messaging app Lola, who says, “Innovation happens with small teams.” Read more at Skift

There’s a Communication Gap Between Business Travelers and Employers: Most business travelers want to follow their employers’ rules while on the road. If only they knew what those rules were. Read more at Skift

Exclusive: Ctrip CEO on How It Moved In to Buy Skyscanner: Chinese online travel agency Ctrip plans to focus on building soon-to-be-acquired Skyscanner’s airline ticket-booking business on a global scale, taking it beyond merely flight search, Ctrip CEO Jane Jie Sun told Skift. Read more at Skift

Hotels

Marriott Is the Latest Travel Brand to Launch Its Own Startup Accelerator: Several travel brands have launched their own startup accelerator programs in recent years and that trend has become more pronounced in 2016 with Marriott Hotels, for example, launching its Marriott TestBed accelerator in Europe. Read more at Skift

Understanding Virgin Hotel Chicago’s Quick Rise to Consumer Favorite: After being formally open for under a year, the Virgin Hotel Chicago recently won Conde Nast’s Readers Choice poll of 300,000 travelers. Read more at Skift

Building a Budget Hotel Brand Without Trashing Your Boutique Reputation: When a successful brand rides the zeitgeist how does it get bigger without compromising what made it so popular in the first place? It’s a question that Ennismore, the company behind hipster hotel collection The Hoxton, is currently grappling with as it plans the roll-out of a new hotel chain aimed at budget-conscious travelers. Read more at Skift

Hyatt Wants to Make a Bigger Push into ‘Adjacent Spaces’: Hyatt Hotels Corp. wants to do a lot more business beyond the hotel. At an investor day event in New York Tuesday, executives from the company said they are considering investments in existing companies and internal initiatives that would make Hyatt a bigger part of customers’ travel experiences. Read more at Skift

Your Turn

Jonathan Goldstein‘s Heavyweight podcast just wrapped up its outstanding first season over on Gimlet Media last week. Give it a listen over here.

Tips and Comments

Can be sent to gm[at]skift[dot]com or to @grantkmartin

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