Office on the Road : Air Clubs Get Down to Business

When C.R. Smith, head of American Airlines, launched the first of what were to become known as Admirals Clubs a half century ago, he had one inviolate rule: No office equipment was allowed in open view, even on the club receptionist’s desk. Not even a stapler could be left in sight.

Smith wanted his airline’s airport clubs, which for many years were open only to friends of the airline who had been invited to join, to be “places to relax and not think about business.”

Times have changed.

Until not too long ago, the clubs were hardly more than what Smith had envisioned--places for the traveler to stretch out on a sofa or upholstered chair, places to eat peanuts, sip a drink and watch television.

But today they are places where harried executives can conduct business, not hide from it. That’s easier to do away from noisy airport concourses, away from long lines to use telephones in public areas and away from crying babies.

Anyone Eligible

Now, anyone is eligible to join the clubs, though they are particularly favored by business travelers. Some companies pay the membership fees for executives if they travel frequently. The cost varies from airline to airline but is generally about $100 per year.

With the demand from business travelers growing, the nation’s airlines are trying to outdo each other these days in the office-type facilities and other amenities they are providing especially for such customers.

United Airlines, which operates 27 Red Carpet clubs in the United States and overseas, is like many other airlines in providing private conference rooms for such things as sales meetings and interviews of job candidates. American Airlines, like others, has installed personal computers in its 24 Admirals Clubs. Executives bring computer programs on their own discs and go right to work.

Messages, Check Cashing

Airlines are installing facsimile machines that allow executives to send and receive printed material. Many of the personal computers have printers and telephone modems that enable travelers to exchange data electronically with an office or home computer and get a printout at the club. Members can get messages and cash checks at the clubs. There are photocopying machines, writing desks and semiprivate cubicles equipped with credit card telephones.

And Continental Airlines is carrying it all a step further. When it opens a new club at its Newark hub this summer, it will provide secretarial service there.

Some clubs have conference rooms large enough to hold sizable meetings. At its Atlanta hub, Eastern Airlines’ Ionosphere Club can handle meetings of up to about 30 people. The rooms have kitchen facilities and catering services.

“Over the last few years, we started to change the focus of the club rooms from the old concept of a lounge,” said Richard C. Buchman, product manager for United’s Red Carpet Clubs. “We added features that would appeal to business persons so they could make productive use of their time. We got the message that, in the short time they would be there, they wanted to do more than just watch TV.”

John W. Temple, Northwest Airlines’ vice president for marketing programs, said Northwest’s 24 WorldClubs try to “keep pace with the way (the) more than 60,000 members conduct business and thereby make them more productive.”

Widespread adoption of hub-and-spoke scheduling by the airlines has resulted in increased emphasis on the clubs. A hub-and-spoke system, which looks much like a bicycle wheel when laid out on a diagram, involves having planes fly in and out of a centrally located hub airport to and from a variety of cities.

With such a system, an airline is able to serve many more combinations of cities but there are fewer non-stop flights because virtually all of an airline’s flights must pass through the hub city. Passengers typically spend an hour or so on the ground at the hub, waiting for flights, and that’s where the airline clubs come in.

Don’t Have to Leave

Northwest’s Temple said the advantage of the clubs is that business people can avoid having to leave the airport “to make a . . . presentation before catching the next flight.”

Many executives swear by the clubs and say that they have helped them make money--or at least not to lose business. One measure of their increasing popularity is the fact that the average length of a visit to an airline club has increased to an hour from 35 minutes a decade ago, according to United Airlines.

Michael J. Green, a Chicago paper salesman who made 165 plane trips last year, of which 100 were on United, is a lifetime member of the Red Carpet Club. He uses the conference rooms frequently, he said, meeting customers and writing reports there.

Recently, he recalled, he was three hours late arriving back in Chicago from Kansas City, too late in the day to go to his office. So he just stayed in a conference room in the club at O’Hare airport.

“That prevented me from losing a big order,” he said. “I had a customer who was paranoid about people calling him back quickly. I got a message that he called and I called him back from the club before going home. There was a soft market (for paper) at the time and I would not have gotten that order. I was able to call the mill, confirm his order for 1,200 tons. The deal was worth $840,000.”

On other occasions he makes the club his office for the day. “I can hit people coming through in the morning. Then I can hit someone coming through in the middle of the day and I can meet another customer on his way home in the afternoon,” he said.

Like Speak-Easies

Airline clubs, usually situated close to the airline’s main concourse, are operated in a manner reminiscent of the speak-easies of Prohibition days. To keep non-members out, entry is generally gained through doors in unobtrusive places. Members push a buzzer and someone inside allows them entry with a return buzz.

The clubs are not big moneymakers for the airlines but, not unlike frequent-flier programs, they are meant to build and maintain customer loyalty. A recent study shows that the average member of an airline club visits a club between 15 and 20 times a year.

“Industry-wide, the clubs are self-sustaining,” said Ronald A. Crisi, manager of clubs for USAir. “Hopefully, they can make a profit, but that is not the main objective. The clubs are marketing tools to provide our customers with an island of solace.”

USAir operates 11 USAir Clubs and will open another five this year. It has about 46,000 members. Piedmont Airlines, which has been bought by USAir, has 15 club locations of its own and 32,000 members.

The carriers hope that the clubs will generate loyalty among travelers and influence them to fly the airline to whose club they belong.

“The club is there because we hope it generates incremental business for us,” United’s Buchman said. “Because there is a membership fee attached, it makes a nice income for us. But . . . that is not primarily the purpose. Hopefully, it will influence people to fly United.”

Delta Airlines, which has about 20,000 members enrolled in its Crown Room Club, says it loses money on its 33 club locations but feels it must operate them for competitive reasons. “The clubs provide an additional reason to fly with us,” Matt C. Guilfoyle, Delta’s director of consumer marketing, said.

Worth the Cost

Generally, business travelers say airline clubs are worth what they cost--and the cost varies from airline to airline. Continental Airlines, for example, charges a $25 initiation fee for its Presidents Club and an $80 annual fee--$100 if a spouse is also a member. A three-year membership is $200, or $260 for a couple. A lifetime membership costs $775, including the initiation fee, and $975 with a spouse. Some airlines charge an extra hourly fee for the use of conference rooms, which, because of high demand, must be reserved in advance.

American Airlines’ Admirals Club has more than 100,000 members, according to Kenneth A. Gilbert, the club manager. There is a $50 initiation fee and annual fees of $100.

United, which says there are “several hundred thousand” Red Carpet Club members, charges a $100 initiation fee, $85 annual dues, $50 annual dues for spouses, $2,075 life membership for new members and $1,475 for life membership for spouses.

While most airport club functions involve business, that is not always the case.

Mr. and Mrs. Christopher Cross said their marriage vows at the USAir Club in Pittsburgh in February. Club employees served as witnesses.

It was the perfect place for the Crosses to exchange their vows. After all, that is where their flights crossed for the first time.