At the Passenger Experience Conference 2018, there was one interesting highlight in the conference programme. And it involves an airline that at Economy Class and Beyond… we’ve been… less than kind to.
I am referring of course to Joon.
The one you’ve all been waiting for next. pic.twitter.com/d1zhIv55P8
— Kevin – Economy Class & Beyond (@EconomyBeyond) April 9, 2018
Sit back. This is one good, by one anyone standards.
The briefing room itself was packed out – with both industry and press there waiting to ask the questions on their minds.
So firstly, there was a video. And yes – you lucky people get to see it too.
Umm. #PEC2018 pic.twitter.com/nASULVuGQB
— Kevin – Economy Class & Beyond (@EconomyBeyond) April 9, 2018
Well… that video still has what you might say a little “je ne sais quoi” to it. With that done, it was time for the main talk.
So, why Joon? It’s a method for Air France to be quicker to a market. As for the name, it was chosen because it was “punchy”, with a memorable colour to go with it.
As for a business model…
What do they mean by that? The LCC’s have been attacking them from below, whilst other legacies are re-focusing their efforts. Meanwhile – they want to try things that they can’t do at-scale with the main Air France brand – thus trying out things that may or may not work.
The idea is if things work – they will be rolled into the main brand… and if not – they’ll remain a joon’ism. One example is the uniform – which is made from 60% recycled materials. Could it scale to the mainline?
One of things they were keen to emphasise was that “Being a millennial is a mindset – not a demographic” – and that their customer target was beyond the “millennial” market
The fleet was discussed – which is coming from Air France Mainline. The current plans to 2020 call for a total of 28 aircraft, split as 18 short/mid-haul (using A320 family aircraft), and 10 long-haul (using A340 aircraft).
Currently, this is crewed by up to 500 staff, with plans to scale to 1000 by 2020.
In terms of service, Short-haul is an odd mix of having a welcome drink, but having buy’-on-board services. Business Class remains as “Air France Mainline”… except I’ve had field reports that state the opposite – with hot services replaced with cold services.
Euro-Joon.
IFE on short-haul is a streaming IFE solution called YouJoon. Seats have USB Power to help in that case to charge devices on the plane.
Let’s move onto the long-haul network, where Joon is expanding slowly (by swallowing up existing Air France network services).
Taking the world by Joon – One city at a time.
Long haul offers a three class cabin with a slope-style seat, a premium economy cabin and an economy cabin. IFE is powered by a Zodiac Rave IFE system – as well as a streaming option. As to disposing of seatback screens and going totally streaming? The airline doesn’t see that happening for 10 years or so.
Other touted features were a “kickstarter” to get family and friends to donate towards a flight, as well as pre/post flight assistance
But Joon has problems – the expectation of two differing product and passenger experience settings between that of itself an Air France – and unless you’re looking carefully – the first you’ll know if it is when you see a plane in Eurowhite and Electric-Blue parked at the gate.
Whilst Joon was set up as a way around wages and work, using it as a lab might work – but do you need to set up an entirely different brand to test and experiment? It seems a big thing to do just to run experiments.
In the medium to long-term, we’ll find out how Joon gets on. But for a lot of us… what is Joon?
It’s a rooftop bar. And also an airline.
So what do you think to that? Go wild in the comments section. I know you want to…
Images, Economy Class and Beyond at the Passenger Experience Conference 2018. Content – Air France/Joon.
Economy Class and Beyond was a media delegate at the Passenger Experience Conference 2018
Welcome to Economy Class and Beyond – Your no-nonsense guide to network news, honest reviews, with in-depth coverage, unique research as well as the humour and madness as I only know how to deliver.
Follow me on Twitter at @EconomyBeyond for the latest updates! You can also follow me on Instagram too!
Also remember that as well as being part of BoardingArea, we’re also part of BoardingArea.eu, delivering frequent flyer news, miles and points to European reader
What in the actual f**k is going on?
Why the abuse in hashtags?
Why so much blue?
I have so many questions….
Why?
Feels like this is their marketing strategy. Create noise. Create confusion. Create questions. Being loud.
And I feel like it’s kind of working. Here we all are. Asking questions, being curious, and talking about this brand that did not even exist up until recently. Fed like an evolution of how Ryanair used to use shock value and outlandish headlines to dominate the press and get people talking about them.