That Million-Dollar Smile

Jaded by pastel planes and miniskirted stewardesses, bored with imitation-fur lap throws and delicatessen sandwiches, airline passengers are being enticed with a new frill. Since April, Trans World Airlines has been trying to attract business with an idea as cold as cash and as warm as a smile. It is offering employees a chance to exchange courtesy for $1,000,000.

As part of its "Happiness Campaign," TWA divided its employees into groups according to their job categories and the size of the cities in which they are based. The groups compete against each other to see which can best please the public. The judges are the customers; they mark ballots to cite those who give them the snappiest service. Employees in winning groups receive $100 each and a chance to draw for bigger prizes ranging up to a sports car or $2,700 in cash.

Jackpot. The campaign has had its effect on service. Reservation clerks, sporting straw skimmers with hatbands proclaiming "Happiness," give the weather report as they announce the gate number. While demonstrating oxygen masks, stewardesses tell passengers about the epicurean banquet that lies ahead. One Pittsburgh cargo handler helped his group win by carrying a big box out to a shipping customer's car, stowing it in the trunk, then walking around to open the car door--and bowing.

If nothing else, the campaign has lifted employee morale. In the first of four contests, 14 of the 125 competing city groups have won $256,100. According to the balloting among large cities, Chicago has the sweetest stewardesses, Kansas City the cheeriest flight officers, and Paris the nicest reservation clerks. In Paris, Reservation Clerk Denise Boivin picked up $1,000 and, for her victory statement, borrowed a slogan from another company: "Everyone is trying harder."

Earnings Up. The campaign was the idea of TWA's adwoman, Mary Wells Lawrence, who also started the battle of the frills in 1965 when she persuaded Braniff to paint its planes pastel and outfit the stewardesses in original Pucci culottes. After she married Braniff President Harding Lawrence, it became obvious that the family relationship was too cozy for business. The conflict was resolved last summer when she won the TWA account and Braniff dropped her. Last week she announced that earnings of her agency, Wells, Rich, Greene Inc., rose 63% to $801,000 during the first half of its fiscal year. The total was boosted in part by TWA's $30 million ad budget.

As for TWA, President F. C. Wiser says: "We are happy being happy." He has little else to take comfort in. Earnings dropped 47% last year as airport delays mounted, labor costs soared and the line added more planes than it could profitably fill. For the first four months of 1969, TWA suffered a deficit of $17 million. Its executives could obviously use a Happiness Campaign themselves.

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