Spilt Wine

57. Plans and Confusion

Wednesday 14 May 1986

Catherine and I saw that the fax had spooled out a short page when we came down in the morning. I tore the sheet off on the cutter and read it to her, "The flights are all oversold, but the front looks good on the 17th and 19th. It appears all of Holland is coming to Expo. I told Edith to book two seats on each day, and I'd tell her which to cancel. When do you want to fly?"

I turned to Catherine and asked, "How's the seventeenth sound to you?"

"I don't understand. All the flights are oversold, but we can still get seats?"

"In the front. Often there are unsold seats at the much higher first-class fare. Our booking First Class makes two fewer seats for the lower-fare passengers to spill over into the front from the oversold rear of the plane."

"So, the ones who are moved to the first-class section – they get all the extra service and comfort but still pay the lower fare?"

"A few do. Some of the airlines have now started frequent client loyalty programs. CP keeps a list of its best customers and treats us well, selecting who to move forward to fill unsold first-class seats. Since I supply the airline with their French, Italian and Australian wine, they treat me extremely well. At check-in, I am almost always moved forward, and I'm given full first-class service. Some who are moved forward get only a seat, a larger and more comfortable seat, but the ordinary food and wine from the rear."

"You supply wine to the airlines? You continue to amaze me. How did you manage to arrange that?"

"A few years ago, after I finally got tired enough of the swill they were serving on the flights, I phoned Ian Gray, the airline's President – their headquarters are in Vancouver. He had taken a wine-tasting course I was teaching, so this gave me an easy in. I laid out a plan that would provide higher-quality wine to customers and cost the airline much less. The idea intrigued him."

"Higher quality for lower cost. That idea intrigues me too. What's the catch?" She started pulling me toward the kitchen.

"No catch. At the time they were buying all their alcohol through the LDB, the government liquor monopoly, at full shelf price. They were excused the import duty and excise taxes for international flights. That was standard practice with the Canadian airlines. I suggested they save shipping costs, import expenses and government markups and buy their Australian wines in Australia, their Italian in Italy and their French wines in France and warehouse them in bond at the airports for their international flights."

"Sounds like a no-brainer to me."

"That's the thing, isn't it? Everybody was using their brains trying to devise ways to save money, manipulating processes, cutting quality, spinning, spinning ... My solution was organic, sensed, not contrived. There was thinking involved, of course in setting up the mechanics, but the inspiration wasn't from conceptualising, wasn't from designing camels."

Catherine tilted her head. "Designing camels?"

"Comes from the old joke: What's a camel? It's a horse that's been designed by a committee. So back to the question, what do you think of flying on the seventeenth? That's this Saturday, we'd have to leave here on Friday."

"Great! – If that's when you're going – I'll go when you do." She gave me an impish grin.

"Saturday's flight is much better – non-stop, the polar route. Monday is through Toronto with a change."

"Polar route?"

"It heads up over Iceland, the middle of Greenland and Baffin Island well above the Arctic Circle."