For Business Fliers, Change is in the Air
Those who love useless plane-hopping may be devastated
By Ed Goldman
Back on June 2, The Goldman State—Your Source for Fun-Based Journalism®—reported that Home Depot says we’re simply not tackling enough screw-it-yourself projects to help the store maintain its net worth of (gasp) $291.69 billion.
Suggested public service announcement: “Little Home Depot will go to bed hungry tonight unless you buy a table saw this afternoon and seriously maim yourself after dinner in your garage workshop. Please call today to make a pledge: 1-800-911.”
Fly-by-night outfit
That was bad enough. But now we learn that the travel industry, specifically American Airlines, is indignant about our no longer taking enough pointless business trips.
We’re simply not booking our fair share of flights to allow the airlines to meet a mysterious quota that allows them, in turn, to offer companies deep discounts on tickets.
We should be ashamed of ourselves.
Not only did we discover during the COVID epoch that most of us who began working at home didn’t miraculously become amateur carpenters, plumbers and electricians—but also that we really didn’t have to fly to meetings Monday through Thursday when we could accomplish the same financial results, and maybe better ones, by sitting on our collective assets in our comfortable living rooms, dens or newly converted maim-free garage workshops.
Of course, if we actually miss those crowded, often-late flights and peanut snack-bags—provided no one on our trip, previous trips or trips yet to come was ever allergic to peanuts—we can always replace them by inviting too many children to a pool party on a day when we know it’s going to rain and making sure that one of the kids has strep. Overcrowding and illness have never been this easy and affordable!
“American (Airlines) had a realization: The customers it treats like royalty when they catch a 5 a.m. flight for a work meeting and the customers trying to redeem their miles for a family trip to Hawaii are often the same people,” the Wall Street Journal reports. “It shouldn’t matter so much why they are flying…(T)heir experiences should be similar.”
How does that travel hybrid play out in our ever-practical world?
a. Children would need to behave more like adult business travelers:
LITTLE KID TO AIRLINE ATTENDANT: I’d like a juice-box with a straw and a lemon twist. Also, can you take a bag of Skittles to the girl in Row 5 and ask if she’s getting off at Magic Mountain or flying through to Disneyland? I’d like to discuss second grade with her over choclate milks.”
b. Businesspeople would need to remember they’re traveling with their family, not colleagues:
WORKING MOM TO KIDS: All right, kids, when we land, here’s our exit strategy. Billy, you take Beulah’s hand and walk to the front of the plane. But wait there until Daddy unloads the steamer trunk from the overhead bin. Sally, you stay back with Daddy and make sure he isn’t rude to the other passengers.
SALLY: I’m not your daughter, Ma’am. My mommy’s the pilot and my daddy’s on a business trip with his niece from Baltimore.
COMPANY TRAVEL MANAGER: Hello, is this No-Nonsense Corporate Travel Bookings?
RECORDING: If you’re calling to make a payment, press one. If you’re going to an important business meeting, press your pants suit. If you’re calling to get a travel discount, don’t press your luck. That plane has left the tarmac.
Ed Goldman's column appears almost every Monday, Wednesday and Friday. A former daily columnist for the Sacramento Business Journal, as well as monthly columnist for Sacramento Magazine and Comstock’s Business Magazine, he’s the author of five books, two plays and one musical (so far).
Yes, Virginia
A Weekly Blog by Virginia Varela
President, Golden Pacific Bank, a Division of SoFi Bank, N.A.
photo by Phoebe Verkouw
FOOD FOR THOUGHT AT ALCHEMIST KITCHEN
I love to eat, and some of my favorite foody experiences come from the ground up. By that I not only mean plant-based, but also prepared by the caring hands at a local small business.
So I’ve been pleasantly surprised in the years I’ve lived and worked here to find that Sacramento—the capital city of California, which boasts of the fifth largest economy in the world—has some of the best food in the world, prepared in a manner reflecting our diversity and breadbasket hub.
One of my favorite nonprofits in the Sacramento area is Alchemist, whose mission statement is “We connect community to land, food and opportunity.” One of several programs at this organization is the “Alchemist Kitchen.”
It’s a business training program and incubator serving aspiring food entrepreneurs from low-income populations in Sacramento.
“Alchemist Kitchen consists of two phases that build business acumen,” says its website. “Alchemist Microenterprise Academy (AMA) is a 12-week business training course that teaches the basics of starting a food business. Topics covered range from financial literacy and legal business structures to recipe development and safe food handling.
‘The Incubator Program is open to select graduates of AMA and provides in-depth assistance customized to specific business needs—including technical assistance, mentorship and low-cost kitchen access.”
The organization also operates a shared-use commercial kitchen in North Sacramento. “As we have worked with new food entrepreneurs, we have recognized the need for an affordable, shared-use commercial kitchen to provide them with the means to safely and legally prepare their food. It is our hope that this space will not only provide local food businesses with the tools needed to start and grow, but also provide a supportive entrepreneurial community.”
Golden Pacific Bank, a division of SoFi Bank, NA recently gave Alchemist CDC a $10,000 grant to support its mission. The group responded that it “is honored to receive support from Golden Pacific and SoFi Bank for our Alchemist Kitchen program.
“Alchemist Kitchen empowers food entrepreneurs from low-income backgrounds and under-resourced communities to start and grow their businesses through a two-phase program that provides education and wrap-around business services to support entrepreneurs and guide them through business ideation, launch and further development.
“Golden Pacific Bank/SoFi’s support will help us serve more entrepreneurs so they can grow their businesses to sustainability, accumulate savings and achieve personal economic stability.”
So writes Davida Douglas, Operations Director for Alchemist Community Development Corporation. It’s wonderful food for thought.
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