Consumer-Friendly Design

A friend and I were recently discussing the generally bad design of airplane interiors. It is incomprehensible to me that more airlines historically and currently do not make an effort to improve the atmosphere of the area in which their customers will spend so much time. I wonder how much positive customer response would be generated by an airline that made a sincere effort not to subject their consumers to what amounts to a temporary imprisonment in a grimy, cramped can. While that question will have to wait, a different area of the airline user-interface has roused the ire of designers. The cluttered, confusing American Airlines website prompted experience builder Dustin Curtis to write an open letter the company that included a sample redesign of his own making and the recommendation that the AA design team be fired. He has since qualified the latter statement after receiving an actual response from a member of the AA UX team. Although the response agrees with Curtis' fundamental argument (that the AA website is in need of a more customer-friendly design), it also enumerates the reasons why it looks the way it does and why it is supremely difficult to improve. The underlying reasons amount to bureaucracy and stymieing corporate culture, which is are more depressing than the visible result, if that's possible. AA apparently considers quite a few things to be more imporatant than consumer satisfaction. I suggest they rearrange their priorities.

P.S. Curtis' effort has inspired another designer to embark on a boarding-pass-improving adventure. You can follow the saga here.