Films, TV, gate info fall into fliers' lap
ALASKA AIR: Passengers on long flights can watch programmed fare for a fee.
By SARANA SCHELL
Anchorage Daily News
(Published: September 11, 2003)
Alaska Airlines passengers on some long-distance flights will be able to watch movies or television, listen to music and surf gate information via laptoplike units starting in October, the company said.
First-class passengers on long flights -- including the Anchorage-Chicago run -- can watch shows like "The Simpsons" for free, but coach passengers will be asked to cough up around $10 to watch "Ice Age" or listen to Madonna on a rented digEplayer.
The new way to entertain passengers came from an airline employee, a baggage handler and entrepreneur who saw a way around the airline's problem: It had started offering five- and six-hour transcontinental flights but didn't have a way to show movies on its planes.
Frustrated customers and employees wanted to know why the airline, which prides itself on offering customers a little more, wasn't ponying up.
Marketing department manager Dave Palmer spelled it out in an in-company newsletter. First, a satellite system couldn't deliver content in Canada or Mexico, two places the airlines regularly flies through or to. Second, it would involve a half-million-dollar investment per plane, with the weight adding some $80,000 in extra annual fuel costs.
"Geez, should we be investing $500,000 per airplane that technology could outstrip," like audio systems supplanted by Sony Walkmans and in-plane telephone ousted by cell phones, Palmer asked. The answer came up no. "We'd never recoup our investment."
Employee Bill Boyer, who was running a day spa and two coffee shops and being a barristo when he wasn't working as a baggage handler, came up with an idea for a portable system and took it to Palmer.
"It was a very elegant idea, very simple," Palmer said. But without content, it was an empty box. So Palmer challenged Boyer to go get content.
"I went down to Hollywood and knocked on some doors," said Boyer, 38. Twentieth Century Fox had already responded to a letter from Boyer and signed on to provide movies.
Unlike a DVD player, all the content is programmed into the box -- no popping in a disc of your best friend's wedding. While it won't take the place of passengers' laptops, it will supply lots of viewing and listening options.
Digital Music Express contributed 10 hours of music. Alaska Airlines has gate information, promotions and travel guides for the cities it serves on the player.
Boyer said his company, APS Inc., is talking to golf courses about buying advertising time on units.
"This is one of the most exciting new products I have seen in a long time," said Julian Levin, a vice president with Twentieth Century Fox, in a press release for the product.
Palmer said Alaska Airlines is thrilled with the product's flexibility. The company can invest in the technology a few units at a time, units can stay in a market while planes are rotated through different flights, and customers pay if they want to.
"We'll see what the appetite is for them" in flights between Seattle to the East Coast and between Anchorage and Chicago, Palmer said, "then move into other markets.
"We're all about trying to offer choices," Palmer said. "Some people just want a book."
