There’s an excellent article in the Cleveland Plain Dealer this week about how the United-Continental merger is coming along. The piece does a great job showing how the merger will touch customers– especially frequent travelers.
>For example, the red carpet that United customers are used to seeing at boarding gate for elite level members will be switched out for Continental’s blue. (“Red is not in our color wheel.”)
>Cocktails at Red Carpet Clubs will be complimentary as they are now at Continental Presidents Clubs.
>United’s famous “Rhapsody in Blue” will remain the boarding music on the merged carrier.
>As many of us already know (and are thankful for), United’s Economy Plus seating will be installed on the Continental fleet…but not until next year.
>Not included in the piece (since Cleveland is a Continental town) is that Continental’s flights at SFO have already moved from Terminal 1 to United’s Terminal 3.
United execs say that the melding of the two carriers is currently about half done.
Here’s the link to the full story.
How you YOU feel about the United-Continental merger? Are you pleased so far? Or not?
As a Premier member on United, it now seems as if my chances of ‘automatic upgrades’ are zero. I used to be upgraded quite frequently (or near the top of the list), but now I don’t have an ice cube’s chance in hell (lately, I am ~30-40th on the list). I feel that this is likely due to all of the competition from new Continental Premier members, but with the same #, if not fewer, number of flights scheduled out of SFO. Obviously, this merger is not pleasing to me! 🙂