Global Exec Aviation would like to thank you for smoking. Sorta.
The charter airline is sympathetic to the feelings of smokers, a rarity in today’s world. Spend a few hours on a plane, if you’re in the habit of puffing, and the result is a nic fit with an intensity determined by the length of your flight. Cross the Atlantic, and that first opportunity to light up is impossible to describe.
No, Global Exec Aviation isn’t going to let you fire up in flight, but it will give you the next best thing. The airline is partnering with Blu Cigs, which makes electronic cigarettes. The devices emit a mist rather than smoke, and the vapor contains the nicotine that makes a long flight easier to bear. So, if you fly Global Exec, there will be Blu Cigs on hand for you.
“Definitely it’s the first step,” Jason Healy, president of Blu Cigs, says of the partnership with Global Exec Aviation of Long Beach. “It’s largely to gather feedback … and just highlight the fact it’s an option.”
Smoking has been prohibited on all commercial flights to, from and within the United States since 2000, USA Today reports, but charter flights can choose to allow smoking as long as they provide a non-smoking section.
For those hoping the Blue Cigs will be provided on commercial flights … don’t hold your breath. Southwest spokesman Brad Hawkins told USA Today, “We have no plans to offer e-cigarettes, and we currently do not allow their use in-flight.” A spokesman for American Airlines says the same.
Jason Holi, one of the operations managers at Global Exec thinks that perspective might be a bit hasty:
“We’re in a customer-service industry,” Holi says. “If I have a passenger who’s a white-knuckle flier but a heavy chain smoker, I want to make it as accommodating as possible for him.”
Keeping your customers happy – what a novel concept!
[photo by Vanessa Pike-Russell via Flickr]