A great Monday afternoon to everyone! How are you? The latest edition of PlaneBusiness Banter is now posted!

This week we have a busy issue as we talk about the impact of the FAA fire at its Aurora Center outside of Chicago, (we also give you our take in a column about just why the FAA is NOT the problem here — it’s a much broader issue involving a total lack of recognition of how important aviation and transportation is to our economic well-being in the U.S.)

The FAA is simply the most convenient whipping boy.

Let’s move up a level, shall we? Let’s talk about funding. Or better yet, lack of.

We also discuss the fascinating back and forth that occurred last week — after Delta announced across the board raises for its employees and an advance on their 2014 profit sharing benefit.

While we acknowledge that this is great news for Delta employees — this just wasn’t a case of Richard Anderson donning a Santa hat two months early.

There were a couple of things going on here, including the IAM’s current card campaign going on for the Delta flight attendant group, and American Airlines’ tentative agreement with its flight attendant group — which was just about to be sent out the door — when the employee memo at Delta went viral.

That TA had given flight attendants at American “industry leading” numbers. Well, after the announcement from Richard, that was no longer the case.

The result? The APFA went back to management at American and got…more money.

Meanwhile, if we’re strictly talking pay rates, the flight attendants at Southwest Airlines still top everyone.

Oh, let’s see. We have new A380s arriving at DFW this week, we have Emirates apparently putting the screws to Airbus to get them to re-engine the A380, we have another new livery to show you (and this one is gorgeous) and oh yes, we talk about Sean Menke’s new gig at Hawaiian Airlines.

As for stocks, it was a lousy week for airline stocks last week. Meanwhile, analysts are busy tuning up their 3Q14 estimates, as this quarter comes to a close.

Oh, and yes, Wolfe Research analyst Hunter Keay downgraded shares of Delta Air Lines last week. Not unexpected. We agree with the reasons he gave. We go over these in this week’s issue too.

All this, and much, much, more in this week’s issue of PlaneBusiness Banter!

Good evening everyone. The latest issue of PlaneBusiness Banter is now posted.

We are a day late this week. (But not a dollar short!) I thank everyone for their patience. Yours truly was part of a fabulous event on Sunday in Philadelphia. I was part of a case study presentation given to the Arthur Page Society – a group comprised of top level executives and corporate communications officers of Fortune 500 companies. The topic? The role communications played in the American Airlines/US Airways merger.

Leading the presentation was American Airlines CEO Doug Parker and EVP of People and Communications Elise Eberwein. In addition to myself, the panel included Laura Glading, President of the Association of Professional Flight Attendants; Scott Shankland, former national officer with the Allied Pilots Association; Gregg Polle, Managing Director, Moelis & Co.; Paul Denis, Partner, Dechert LLP; Hilary Rosen, Managing Director, SKDKnickerbocker, and Kelly Sullivan, Partner, Joele Frank.

It was a great experience. In addition, it was striking to sit back and reflect on just exactly was accomplished. It’s a deal that I doubt will never be repeated in this industry. Or maybe any other industry.  By that I mean — a smaller company successfully pulled off a hostile takeover of a larger company — while that larger company was in bankruptcy protection.

What was the “secret sauce”? As I talk about in this week’s issue, it wasn’t the price. In fact the deal was not “priced” until very late in the process.

No, it was — communication. Intense, constant, coordinated and strategic communication.

Yep. It was a cool way to spend a Sunday.

In other news, it was a blockbuster week for union news last week, as we had a TA announced with the flight attendants at American Airlines; the APA was certified by the NMB as the bargaining agent for the pilot group (bye bye USAPA); the customer service workers at both US Airways and American will now be represented by the same joint representation that was in place at US Airways — the Teamsters and the CWA; Piedmont pilots approved a new contract; and United Airlines rolled out a very impressive “Early Out” offer for flight attendants that pays out as much as $100K. (Depending on years of service.)

Whew!

On top of all this, I was in Washington last week, where I moderated a panel at Airlines for America’s Aviation Summit. Great experience. Great list of speakers throughout the day. I give you some of the better quotes from the sessions in this week’s issue. Oh and I’ll also introduce you to the man who controls more shares of stock in U.S. airlines than any other investor.

Yep. True.

All this and much, much, more in this week’s edition of PlaneBusiness Banter!

Good evening everyone! We’re baaack!

Yes, vacation is over, and it’s time to get back to work. Or at least that is what I kept telling myself last week. As a result, this week’s issue of PlaneBusiness Banter is now posted.

This is one of our “catch-up” issues. It’s rather difficult to compress three weeks into one issue, but I tried to talk about those topics we thought were most noteworthy. Or at least mention them!

On the stock side, August was a great month for airline stocks. The dog days of August are often times not that friendly to the things with wings, but that was not the case this  year. The only negative about August was the sharp decline in jet fuel inventories that occurred right before Labor Day in the Northeast. The shortage caused jet fuel prices to jump more than 6% that week, as inventories fell to record lows.

All is now back to normal on that front as a number of  tankers have been able to get into New York Harbor and offload their cargo.

In other news, Southwest Airlines and Frontier Airlines will both roll out new liveries this week. Pics of both were leaked over the weekend. We posted the Southwest Airlines livery last night. Here is a shot of the new Frontier livery. The green livery with the feathered “F” harkens back to previous branding at the airline — years ago.

In other news, we talk a bit this week about the union activity over at American, get you updated on that, although I did not get into detail about the decision by American to pull flying from Envoy and give it to PSA. A number of the folks we wanted to talk to just simply weren’t able to be tracked down before we published. I’ll revisit this move by the airline this week.

Speaking of this coming week, look for analysts to be watching the traffic reports issued by the airlines very carefully this week. Delta reported less than robust PRASM numbers for August last week, and analysts will be watching everyone else to see if it is a one-off for Delta only, or if the rest of the industry is showing any signs of weakness as well.

Tomorrow morning, I am off to the Southwest Airlines Media Day. More on that in next week’s issue.

Have a great week everyone. Talk to you again next week.