Airline marriages can be messy

last updated 8 January 2015

When two airlines like United and Continental join forces, “even simple-seeming choices grow comically intricate,” said Drake Bennett in Bloomberg Businessweek. Since the airlines’ merger was announced in 2010, they have had to synchronize not only employment and ticketing systems but also thousands of operational procedures. Should passengers board planes back to front, as they did on Continental, or window to aisle, as United preferred? Can miniature ponies travel in the cabin? (It was decided that they can.) Should nuts be served in a bag or heated in a ramekin? (Ramekin.) Should unaccompanied minors wear a bracelet or a button? (Bracelet.) Even figuring out how strong to brew the 62 million cups of coffee served on board each year, says Sandra Pineau-Boddison, United’s vice president for food services, requires “a little bit of rocket science.”