Lufthansa, Swissair, Air France Realign U.S. Sales
<B> Lufthansa, Swissair, Air France Realign U.S. Sales</B>
By Jay Campbell
European carriers serving the U. S. market have made significant changes in their sales teams on this side of the Atlantic.
The biggest philosophical change comes from Lufthansa, which on May 1 moved to what it calls "channel management," a concept that dedicates sales personnel to different segments of the customer base--key corporate and agency accounts, consolidators, leisure and tour operators, and retail agencies--rather than to different regions. As part of the change, it closed five offices and enlarged the regional coverage of the remaining five. Earlier, competitor KLM had closed its U.S. offices and turned over its sales needs to partner Northwest (<I>BTN,</I> April 27).
"Unlike KLM, we're not closing everything," said national key accounts manager Alexander Rahe, based in East Meadow, N.Y. "But still we are leaner and smaller."
Rahe's key accounts division, which now has 22 people, includes six inside sales managers who handle smaller corporate and agency accounts and ten account managers who regularly visit large accounts.
Meanwhile, Air France has retained a regional approach, hiring two new regional sales managers and redefining the duties of its sales staff. Richard Pasciuto, Eastern region sales manager, came to Air France from US Airways (<I>BTN,</I> April 13), and David Brucia, Western region sales manager, was formerly with Alaska Airlines.
Brucia told Business Travel News that in the past, Air France's U.S. district sales staff acted much like general managers, handling both sales and airport operations. They now handle only sales, with a "total focus on revenue generation."
Air France is concentrating much of its effort on the new cities the airline has added, using its own aircraft and through code sharing with Continental and Delta. The airline also is closely eyeing the small business market (<I>BTN,</I> Sept. 14).
Swissair in March formed a new national key accounts USA department, headed by John Anderson and based in Melville, N.Y. The department is responsible for national corporate accounts, mega agencies, consolidators and tour operators, as well as coordination with Swissair's partners Austrian Airlines, Delta and Sabena.