KLM

KLM’s new game: JETS

Fun Stuff, , ,

KLM JETS_edited

Like playing games on your smartphone when you travel?

Seems like everyone does.

Which is why KLM has a game – called Jets – that puts the two activities together.

Available free in the Apple App Store and the Google Play Store the game is filled with familiar Amsterdam sights (canals, bicycles, drawbridges) and awards in-game currency – Wings – for accomplishing various tasks.

I’ve downloaded the app and am working on the first level – collecting 100 stamps in the city with my paper airplane – but I’ll certainly fall behind any player who’s also a KLM passenger taking a flight out of Amsterdam’s Schiphol Airport.

Thanks to beacon technology installed at the airport, KLM passengers can earn extra Wings when they show up on time for their flight.

KLM has another game you can download and play: Aviation Empire lets you own and manage your own airline.

Win an Airbnb stay in a converted KLM airplane

Airports, Fun Stuff, Hotels, , ,

Now here’s a great way to spend the Thanksgiving weekend: inside an “airplane apartment.”

klm shleve

From now through November 20, you can enter a contest to win an overnight stay – on November 28, 29 or 30 – inside a recently retired KLM MD-11 airplane parked next to Amsterdam’s Schiphol Airport.

The plane has been turned into an apartment with 116 windows, large living room, a master bedroom, an extra room with two beds, a kitchen and eight (!) small bathrooms. There’s also Wi-Fi, library, first class chairs, a game console and plenty to see outside the cockpit window.

KLM AIRBNB PLANE

Sound like the kind of Airbnb digs you might like to try out?

The KLM contest will pick one winner for each of the three nights and each winner may bring up to three guests. Even better: winners also get roundtrip flights on KLM to Amsterdam and a 500 EUR Airbnb gift card.

If you win a night on the airplane there will some rules:

*No flying.
*Don’t use the inflatable emergency slide.
*Smoking is not allowed when the non-smoking sign is on.
*No marshmallow roasting with the jet engines.

There’s more information – and details on entering the contest – in the Airbnb listing.

Frying with Finnair to the UN Climate Summit

Environment, , , , ,

FinnairAirbus 330 HR_edited

Smell that?

The Airbus A330 making Tuesday’s Finnair flight from Helsinki to New York will be running on biofuel partly made from recycled cooking oil from restaurants.

It’s perfectly safe – and Finnair and several other airlines have done it before – but this flight is designed to coincide with the UN Climate Summit taking place in New York and draw attention to the fact that progress is being made on developing environmentally sustainable biofuel.

As Finnair reminds us, “most of an airline’s environmental impact arises from aircraft emissions during flight and switching to a more sustainable fuel source can reduce net CO2 emissions by between 50 and 80 per cent.”

But while everything from used cooking oil to plants, algae, municipal waste, recycled vegetable cooking oil, animal fat and sugarcane have been considered or tested in aircraft in search of safe, alternative, sustainable biofuels, the cost to make that alternative fuel is still at least twice as much – or more – than conventional jet fuel.

But along with Finnair, other airlines, including KLM and Alaska Airlines, airport operators, manufacturers and a variety of governments around the world are working on ways to lower the costs of creating these alternative jet fuels.

So it’s possible that soon you’ll be flying on a jet burning fuel made with old frying oil too.

In-flight social gifting – the next big thing?

Shopping, , ,

klm wanna gives

In a move to make flying a bit more friendly—and to raise revenues—airlines are bringing social media-style giving to the skies.

This week Southwest Airlines introduced a Facebook option that enables people to pool funds to buy a Southwest gift card for a friend or family member.

“It allows a group to come together to give a gift as a thank you or as congratulations for a wedding, a birthday or a major life milestone,” said Southwest spokesman Dan Landson.

In April, Virgin America introduced an in-flight, seat-to-seat drink and snack delivery program that Virgin Group founder Richard Branson described as a way passengers might increase their chances of “deplaning with a plus one.”

And earlier this month social media-savvy KLM introduced an option that expands on the Dutch airline popular program of surprising its passengers with personalized gifts.

The new KLM Wannagives lets people prepurchase gifts—from chocolate and perfume to jewelry or a Delft Blue singing, floating egg-timer—that are delivered by crew members to a passenger during a flight.

“The strength of Wannagives lies not in the fact that we give something extra to our customers, but that we enable people to give each other something special,” KLM’s social business manager Lonneke Verbiezen wrote in a blog post introducing the program.

It’s also a way for the airline and other companies to increase retail sales.

“There’s always a commercial component to these efforts, as there should be. This is business,” said Henry Harteveldt, a travel industry analyst with Hudson Crossing.

“Airlines are becoming much more entrepreneurial and innovative when it comes to securing additional revenues from passengers, be it via preordering duty free or investing in digital platforms for on-board retail,” said Raymond Kollau of Airlinetrends.com. “KLM’s Wannagives is a good example of airlines’ newly found retailing mind-set.”

Items made available as Wannagives are drawn from KLM’s current online shop, with a few products added. Since the program’s Dec. 9 rollout, Champagne with a crystal glass and Godiva chocolates are the most ordered items, said KLM spokesman Koen van Zijl.

“We think the service is a win-win for both our passengers and for the company,” van Zijl said. “We were asked often if it is possible to surprise a passenger on board, and Wannagives now makes this happen. And sure, we aim to increase in-flight sales.”

Looking forward to 2014, industry experts expect the social gifting trend to continue.

“In the digital world we live in, everyone craves more personal connection,” said Brian Erke, CEO and co-founder of social gifting site Gratafy. “This new adventure in simple yet personal gifting offers a sense of camaraderie and the ability to be there for someone, even when you can’t actually be there.”(M

(My story about in-flight social gifting first appeared on CNBC Road Warrior)

In-flight gifting: would you do it?

Shopping, , ,

Perhaps you remember this video featuring Sir Richard Branson introducing Virgin America’s “Seat to Seat Delivery” service allowing passengers to send a drink, a meal or a snack to another passenger using the seat-back ordering system.

In order to send another Virgin America passenger a gift, you need to be on the same plane.

But not on KLM, which has a “WannaGives” program that allows people on the ground to pre-purchase gifts for passengers who will be flying on a KLM flight.

klm wanna gives

The gift-wrapped present can be purchased for cash or miles and will be hand-delivered by the crew during the flight.

For a bit more cash or miles, the airline will also deliver the gift to someone’s home.

KLM’s suggested list of in-flight gifts is quite varied and includes everything from a small bottle of fancy champagne with a crystal glass to preferred seating, perfume, wallets, jewelry, a kid’s pilot set and this adorable Delftblue singing floating egg timer which plays a different traditional Dutch tune depending on whether the egg is soft-boiled or hard.

KLM EGG

Snack Saturday: KLM’s in-flight Dutch fest

Food, Snack Saturday, ,

Throughout October and November passengers on KLM Royal Dutch Airlines flights from Amsterdam will notice a special Dutch theme as the airline celebrates its “From Holland” festival by offering food and entertainment featuring Dutch products and farming.

“The meals KLM on intercontinental flights in World Business Class (WBC) from Amsterdam during the festival are made from all kinds of ingredients produced by Dutch farms, fisheries and suppliers. KLM will serve Willem van Oranje potatoes from Flevopolder, Reypenaer cheese from Woerden, and wine from the coastal province of Zeeland. The desserts have been developed by Huize van Wely. The pike-perch with the Zuiderzeezilver label are also caught in the IJsselmeer and Markermeer just north of Amsterdam. A range of Dutch autumn vegetables and fruit also feature on the menus.”

Yum.

In European Business Class, the “Touch of Dutch” menu will include those Huize van Wely desserts. And in Economy Class on European flights, the Dutch touch will feature large “stroopwafel” syrup biscuits, cheese crackers, and bread rolls filled with Beemster cheese.

Intercontinental Economy Class passengers aren’t left out either: there, the menu will include red cabbage with minced-beef meatballs or a fish dish with a Dutch-cheese sauce.

Not interested in those dishes? KLM says the Dutch products will be offered as an option alongside the international onboard meals it usually serves.

The in-flight “From Holland” festival goes beyond food: on the in-flight entertainment system the airline will be serving up Dutch films, music and other programming.

It all sounds yummy… but I’m still waiting for the opportunity to start collecting those gin-filled, Delft blue, miniature Dutch houses.

Fun food news from SAT airport and KLM-Royal Dutch Airlines

Air Travel, Food, Souvenir Sunday, Souvenirs, , , , ,

Great airport souvenirs usually show up on Stuck at the Airport on Sunday, in the occasional Souvenir Sunday feature, but I make exceptions when it comes to chocolate.

 

(Photo courtesy San Antonio International Airport)

These jalapeno and red chile-flavored chocolate bars were spotted at San Antonio International Airport, which joins the city in celebrating Fiesta.

In addition to this chocolate, airport spokesperson Rich Johnson says that in honor of the citywide party and cultural event, “There are lots of cool, cultural items in our shops, including piñatas, clothing, cascarones (egg shells filled with confetti) and other items.”

There’s also a food-related celebration on some KLM airplanes.

From now through June, the sandwiches served on the European routes flown by KLM Royal Dutch Airlines will sport festive wrapping paper designed by students from an art and design school in the Netherlands.

Students were asked to come up with designs that were “culinary, surprising, inspirational and energetic,” and, after polling Facebook fans and experts, three winners were chosen.

The designs will be featured through June on packaging in KLM’s “Delicious” economy-class flight product line, which includes snacks, meals, sandwiches and hot towels.

Artwork by Silvie Buenen, Tom van der Pijl and Agnes Loonstra; images courtesy KLM.

Tidbits for travelers

Exhibits, , ,

Those colorful puppets on display in Terminal A – West at Philadelphia International Airport are from Spiral Q, the Philadelphia puppet theater well-known for the large-scale, wearable handmade puppets used to gain public awareness of important community issues.

On February 3rd, KLM launched its Meet & Seat program, which allows passenger to choose a seat based on who else is on their flight. The program makes use of Facebook and LinkedIn and was initially only available on flights to and from San Francisco, New York and São Paulo. Now the program has been expanded to ten additional destinations: Rio de Janeiro, Buenos Aires, Mexico City, Atlanta, Houston, Los Angeles, Toronto, Johannesburg, Cape Town and Nairobi.

Willing to give it a try?

KLM invites you to “stewardress” yourself

Airlines, Fun Stuff, , ,

It’s a little corny. Maybe even a little creepy – depending on the photo you choose, but it’s really sort of fun.

KLM has a new Facebook app that lets you “stewardress” (or steward) yourself and send the photo to people you know. You can also buy products with your stewardress photo and – if you’re lucky – win some prizes.

All you have to do is log on through Facebook, upload a photo of your face and choose which of seven vintage outfits you’d like to wear.

Here’s my first try:

Try it yourself and let us know how it turns out.

KLM’s “Meet & Seat” social networking program

Air Travel, Dating, , , ,

On Friday, KLM launched a new social networking program that allows passengers to link their flight reservations with their Facebook or LinkedIn profiles, find out who else is on their flight and make a seat selection or other flight-related plans using that information.

“This new service connects passengers and aims to give them a more inspirational journey,” said KLM managing director Erik Varwijk in a statement announcing the new “Meet & Seat” program.

The program will eventually be available on KLM intercontinental flights, but for now is being tested in a pilot program on flights from Amsterdam to San Francisco, New York and São Paulo.

Here’s how it works: Using KLM’s ‘Manage My Booking’ section, passengers flying on intercontinental flights choose personal information from their Facebook or LinkedIn account to share with other passengers and then link their flight reservations to their profiles. The reservation program allows passengers to choose a seat between 90 days and 48 hours before departure.

“They can find out whether someone they know will be traveling on the same flight, or discover who else will be attending the same conference in the USA,” the airline said in a statement explaining the program. “They might arrange to have a coffee before their flight, select adjoining seats or decide to share a taxi afterwards.”

Raymond Kollau, founder of airlinetrends.com, an industry and consumer research agency, liked the program. “The concept makes perfect sense as people like to surround themselves with like-minded persons,” he said. “It will certainly apply to specific demographics, such as a generation Y, who are more interested in meeting new people, as well as business travelers en route to a conference. Singles will of course also be interested.”

Although KLM claims that it is the first airline to integrate social networking into its regular flight process, this is not the first social seating effort in the skies.

Malaysia Airlines’ MHbuddy program not only allows passengers the option of booking and checking in for a flight on Facebook, it also offers travelers the option of seeing pictures and seat numbers of Facebook friends on the same flight. Alaska Airlines’ Flying Social program also integrates Facebook.

The social seating trend isn’t just for the skies. Last August, Ticketmaster rolled out interactive, Facebook-integrated seat maps that allow ticket buyers to tag their seat locations and see where their friends — or potential friends — will be sitting in a venue.

“We’ve heard stories of seat tagging reuniting fraternity brothers at college football games and making the planning of live event outings much easier,” said Ticketmaster spokesperson Jacqueline Peterson.
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Airline branding consultant Shashank Nigam notes that independent companies Satisfly and Planely enable passengers to find and book seats next to others with specific interests across airlines. Nigam said some travelers may feel such programs are “creepy.” He also questioned how quickly or frequently travelers will adopt the service.

Still, he noted that “Meet & Seat” is the first social seating effort led by a major airline. That’s why, he said, “there is excitement around it and chances are good that it might work.”

(My story: “KLM wants air travelers to get social in the sky” first appeared on msnbc.com)