For a 93-year-old airline, KLM Royal Dutch Airlines is pretty savvy when it comes to social marketing. In its latest social tie-in with its travel services, Dutch airline KLM is giving consumers a chance to experience the rush of running an international airline.

As announced at the Corporate Social Media Summit today in New York, on June 27th KLM will launch Aviation Empire, a Sims-like simulation game for mobile devices.Continue reading...

United's MileagePlus program can now give members access to a lot more than just upgraded seats on an airplane. The rewards program, which includes 25 airline partners under the "Star Alliance" seal has teamed up with ScoreBig.com to give members access to live event tickets from the NBA, NFL, MLB, NHL and college sports to popular family, music and theater performances. 

ScoreBig, which is the first online marketplace for the liquidation of live event tickets will allow MileagePlus members to both earn miles on ticket purchases as well as use miles to make purchases on the site. 

“This is an exciting, first-of-its-kind service offering within the live-entertainment and travel industries," Adam Kanner, ScoreBig CEO said in a press release. "We’re thrilled to be joining with United to introduce ScoreBig to MileagePlus members and to enable them to use or earn MileagePlus miles across millions of tickets at substantial savings."Continue reading...

After more than a year’s worth of rumors, plenty of negotiations and three earlier attempts at merging, US Airways and the bankrupt American Airlines—which made a last-ditch effort to revamp their image earlier this month—have finally agreed to come together and be one. While they're now moving in together and sorting through their stuff, the actual marriage and formal union won't be completed until the third quarter of this year.

In an $11 billion all-stock deal, the two big brands are joining to create the world’s largest airline—but investors and consumers alike are pondering if bigger is indeed better. The new company, which will fly under American’s name and revamped logo but be run by US Airways CEO Doug Parker, is predicting that it “will produce annual savings and new revenue totaling more than $1 billion by 2015,” Bloomberg reports.

"American Airlines is one of the world’s most iconic brands," Parker stated in the merger announcement press release. "The combined airline will have the scale, breadth and capabilities to compete more effectively and profitably in the global marketplace. Our combined network will provide a significantly more attractive offering to customers, ensuring that we are always able to take them where they want to travel, when they want to go."Continue reading...

It's fitting that on Valentine's Day, American Airlines and US Airways would release a video proclaiming their $11 billion union and why they're so compatible. It's not so much a "how we met" story as a "Learn how we will combine the best of both airlines" story. More on the lovebirds at http://aa.com/arriving and in the press release.

KLM Royal Dutch Airlines is amping up its digital engagement with KLM Must See Map, a friend-sourced destination map that combines social and print. 

Users create a map for a destination and ask friends for travel tips via Facebook, Twitter and email. Facebook check-ins show which friends have already visited the destination, their tips on favorite places and their locations. You can add your own tips, then order a copy of the map in print and receive it for free.

Up and running in 24 countries, the application comes from Dutch agency Code d’Azur. “One of the biggest challenges was to ensure that the physical map was a perfect representation of the destination, with the tips provided by friends,” said Nik Nieuwenhuijs, Code d’Azur.Continue reading...

Bankrupt American Airlines found a little extra cash to invest in a lot of paint.

The troubled airline — which is rumored to be considering a merger with US Airways and has irked its union in recent months with threatened job cuts — introduced a new look Thursday, its first major design change in 40 years.

In the airline's new identity, the eagle long a fixture in the airline’s logo has been marginalized. Only a suggestion of it remains in the “neck and head embedded in the design element in front of the American’s lettering at the airplane’s front," The Dallas Morning News noted. Continue reading...

The U.S. federal government’s grounding of all Boeing 787 Dreamliner jets worldwide affects only six planes being operated by a U.S. carrier, all of them by United Airlines. So the abrupt and drastic action by the Federal Aviation Administration – the first time in four decades that regulators effectively have grounded a major airliner – isn’t going to have much effect on U.S. air travel.

Yet the short- and long-term damage to Boeing’s brand could be profound. And it is far from clear that the Chicago-based company is doing enough to address that sort of damage even while it works quickly and closely with airlines and government safety authorities to figure out temporary fixes that will get Dreamliners back in the air. Continue reading...

Passengers stuck inside the plane trapped in the melting tarmac at Washington’s National Airport last July or who happened to be nearby the gent who stripped naked at the Portland International Airport last April to protest the TSA screening process, you might not think that air travel has gotten better recently. 

But the Wall Street Journal’s annual Middle Seat airline scorecard wrapping up airlines' 2012 performance is now out and it showed some improvements industrywide. The percentage of planes pulling in within 15 minutes of when they were supposed to went up to 79 from 76 the year before. Flights cancelled went down to 1.4% from 2.1% in 2011. Fewer bags were lost. Of course, it helped that fewer planes were flying last year, which eased congestion at the gate.

One airline in particular was likely doing the most celebrating: Delta. It had been the worst-ranked airline in 2010 but took a few measures in the past two years to get back to the top. “Careful study of when and where cancellations are most likely, and adjusting spare aircraft availability to keep flights moving if there is a breakdown helped, as did a rebuilt baggage system at its Atlanta hub to reduce lost luggage,” the Journal reports.Continue reading...