Grounded: Midwest Express
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 4 มี.ค. 2021
- This episode of Grounded looks at Midwest Express, later known as Midwest Airlines and was the hometown airline of Milwaukee. Famed for its unbeatable level of service, and cookies, Midwest had began as a corporate travel division within Kimberly-Clark and grew to become a leading coast-to-coast airline beating the major airlines to the top awards.
The cookie crumbled following the events of 2001 but this episode will tell the full story, the rise, the fall and the possible revival, and yes, the cookie, so sit down, strap in and enjoy :)
I genuinely wish I could have travelled with Midwest Express in their heyday, they sounded like an exceptional airline and I honestly hope that this episode has done them proud :)
** PRODUCTION NOTES FOR THIS EPISODE **
*This Episode has been a bit of a nightmare to put together, the script took twice as long as expected, I had to record the audio twice and then it took a twelve hour session just to put the video together. I really hope you enjoy this one, it's one I've wanted to cover and it has also been requested, otherwise I'd have left it on the pile...
*There is a cut in the audio, this is where when I was putting the video together I realised that I repeated a sentence, there was no chance of re-recording the audio so I had to cut it via the video editing suite.
*Chautauqua who were also owned by Republic operated some Skyway flights following the takeover but the exact details are sketchy.
*Midwest Express revised their livery in the early to mid 1990s, the rebrand to Midwest Airline would see a few other tweaks such as the engines being painted and the addition of the lower blue cheatline which tapers aft.
*Republic Holdings, who acquired Midwest are not related to the Republic Airways which was formed via the merger of Southern and North Central which was later acquired by Northwest. I plan on covering that Republic in a future episode :)
*I'm honestly not kidding about the production time with this one, it is well past 2am and I have been putting this final bit together since 11am :/
*A Crumpet is a really nice breakfast treat, it is not a pancake, it needs to be toasted (but not burnt) then have plenty of butter applied to the top of it before eating :) I think they have them in the US, they are not an "English Muffin" though and I believe Warburtons (A bakers who is very local to me) do export them Stateside...
*Crumpet is also a cheeky phrase from the 1970s, see - "On The Buses" by London Weekend Television...
I really appreciate any comments and feedback on this or other episodes as well as suggestions for future episodes. Believe me, if I say that your airline is "on the list", it really is :) I mention several other airlines in this episode and am already working on almost all of them, it just takes time :)
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#MidwestExpress #MidwestAirlines #MidwestConnect
Great history of Midwest. My ad agency, BBDS, created the theme line, 'The Best Care in the Air', which simply stated the philosophy of the airline and all its employees. This was Milwaukee's 'home town airline', and enjoyed the highest level of loyalty of any airline. These were great times, with my group working day by day in helping bring the message of Midwest Airlines to the marketplace.
Thank you for commenting :) It is a great theme line and one which is still easily identifiable today and also lives on in a classic airline joke (the one which AA were the butt of) :)
I got to fly Midwest on a couple occasions, and their service was no joke: My seat mate told the flight attendant that they were going to nap and asked to be woken up when it was time for cookies. Flight attendant said sure, and sure enough, at cookie time: “Sir, it’s time to wake up and here’s your cookie.”
Incredible :) It's a real shame that airlines like Midwest aren't around any more :/
@@ExpoAviation And this was February 2009 too, so even towards the end they were pretty awesome.
Yeah, even though the "hard product" had gone the people still cared :)
My mom worked for them in Milwaukee in the late 90's - early 00's. We got the pleasure of being able to fly standby quite a bit on Midwest Express. I even flew on a small prop plane of theirs from MKE to RHI.
Cool :)
My Uncle was killed In this crash 😢😢
Beechcraft 1900.
Great airline with great employees 👏
I wasn’t around when midwest was still flying but I have heard from people who flew the airline that it had a higher level of customer service than your average American airline
Yep when they said "the best care in the air" they weren't lying :) The thing is, these days a lot of folks would happily pay a little bit more for their ticket if they received the level of service that Midwest offered but instead all the airlines seem to be in a race to the bottom and that sadly is the same over here in Europe too :/
The cookies? They are Pillsbury Chocolate Chip cookies in a tube, that can be found in the refrigerated section in every local grocery store. I worked in the off-site flight kitchen. They would be sliced, and put 8 in a disposable aluminum pan, and put into the convection ovens on the airplanes. The planes ALWAYS smelled like cookies, unlike USAir with their plain old nasty box lunches and overflowing toilets. The best part? After the flight, there were almost always leftover cookies. The guys that drove the food trucks (me), we ate good!
Cool, thanks for the info Ed, I'll be sure to try and grab some the next time I visit the States :) I would definitely prefer the aircraft to smell of fresh cookies than the usual "eau de Boeing" though had I been crew with Midwest I'd have piled on the pounds from eating too many during the flight ;) Glad to hear you got fed :) The best I can offer ground crews these days is a bottle of water :/
Absolutely superb video Phil, they just get better and better. It’s great to find out so much about airlines I don’t know much about. Please, keep them coming 🙂
Thank you :) I've got plenty more to come!
Awesome vid, nice edition to the series
Thank you, I appreciate that :)
I miss Midwest so much
I never got to fly with them but I feel that they are one of the few airlines that I really have missed out on and would love to have experienced.
I remember my first and only flight on Midwest express. They opened a terminal in my home town and offered a discount coupon in the local paper. I was able to fly round-trip between Omaha-LAX for $150 total in Summer 1994.
Awesome! That's a great price on a roundtrip ticket with that level of service :) How come you only had the one trip with them?
Having requested this episode I feel pretty guilty you had to go through all that work to get it up. But I'm super excited, and it's an excellent episode.
It's ok John, I'm just glad you enjoyed it :)
This is just brilliant
Thanks Alex, much appreciated :)
Fantastic video! I enjoy your humour.
Thanks Ryan, I appreciate that :)
First, great video! Second, thank you for sharing some of my content! I never knew the symbolism in their livery -that was great to learn. I had a chance to fly them and missed the opportunity because they canceled the connection to SFO. Also, Eli Timoner founder of Air Florida died yesterday. Spooky...
Thanks mate, I appreciate that! And thanks for the pics, that postcard of the fleet was the ideal opener :) It's a shame you missed your chance with them, but was this before or after they went down the slippery slope? That's a shame, still Acker is hanging on in there so I can keep the not-so-subtle digs going.
@@ExpoAviation This would have been 2003. So definitely on the slope downwards , but not rock bottom. :P
I flew in 1982 from prestwick with ward air Canada in a DC 10 to Calgary and they had a very good in flight service too another very good video greetings from Scotland 🇬🇧🇬🇧🇬🇧
Thanks Ian :) I'm familiar with Ward Air, I hope to cover them soon though I might need to read his book first to get his side of things ;)
@@ExpoAviationthe two brand new MD-88s that Midex first took delivery of were originally ordered by Ward Air
YES....I ENJOY YOUR VIDEOS,,,,IM, RETIRED NOW AND LOOK FORWARD TO NEW VLOGS.......THANKS
Thank you :)
Great to see all these defunct UK and US carriers profiled, however have you considered looking “Down Under”? Love to see your take on Compass, Ansett, TAA.
Thank you :) Yes indeed, in-fact I had started working on a Compass script but hit a bit of a "writer's block" trying to give the background, incidentally two of the Compass A300s were borrowed from Monarch and were the same two for my first ever flights :) I have also been working on a research docket for Ansett, so rest assured I'll be going Down Under soon :)
N500me was at one time the oldest dc9 still flying (i think it was 3rd or 5th dc9 off of assembly line?)... we heard rumors that the Smithsonian offered to buy it from midwest, however it continued flying until it was eventually sold... I think that aircraft is still flying somewhere in Africa... Midwest made Milwaukee a real option to fly non-stop with out having to go to Ohare... It's a joke what mke has become now.
Yes it was the oldest still flying and was number 2 off the line, it would have been great to go into the Smithsonian. I believe the final DC-9 was donated to a museum in Charlotte who then went and scrapped it :( I've never been to MKE though my missus has several times before she met me, I'd like to go soon - as long as she doesn't drag me to a Brewers game ;)
Incorrect. N700ME MSN 45696 line #2 originally delivered to Delta Air Lines as N3301L was the oldest Baby 9 flying until withdrawn from flying status & scrapped in 2005.
@@stevenrobinson2381And she was the best flying of the short ones 😉 (N700ME)
I wish MW had put money into a rail track from ohare/midway into kmke to pull from the Chicago market
I have always found their newer corporate logo to be among the best. As you compared the Milwaukee Art Museum to the logo, there was no resemblance. I see a capture of that and of the Robin bird or other birds that migrate. Too bad trash Frontier airlines took over and ruined the last airline with any class in the USA. And I only flew on em once. They were the best.
Yeah in hindsight it goes well with the final and smart livery, I think I was trying too hard to make a joke there or had heard some reference to them being similar. Looking at it I can indeed see some resemblance to birds. It is definitely a shame that they are no longer around, they would be the best around by miles but then again that was their slogan after all, "the best care in the air" :)
Do Allegheny please
Thanks for the suggestion Stuart, Allegheny is on my to-do list :)
They did too many things at once and were a company run by a fleet of ex pilots pretending to be heads of an major airline. They abandoned all the things that made them popular for Milwaukee in an attempt to stop hemorrhaging money. They were smart enough to cut the E-Jet deal but not smart enough to cut the 717 deal. I speculate that was driven by the pilot union as it was logistically easier to stay with a MD product instead of swapping to an airbus or Boeing fleet. That being said they ran too many routes and some of those were done by both ME and ME connect. In retrospect the cost for fuel was cheaper than making payments on new aircraft. They were the product of bad timing and hindsight being 20/20 they should have slowed their expansion especially in the wake of 9/11. What’s ironic is that ME began by airline deregulation and was ultimately done in by government regulation due to 9/11. They were a nice thought and I personally wish airlines ran today under that same culture that made Midwest express the best care in the air.
You make some good points there, thanks for sharing :)
@@ExpoAviation thank you! And same to you, great video! There’s a LA Times article from if memory serves April of 2001, that states Midwest’s decision between the B717 and the A318 went down to the 11th hour. I can only assume that Tim Hoeksema being a pilot by trade, stuck with the DC/MD product to curl costs from training aircrew, mechanics and the rest on new equipment and that MEP wanted to upgrade their DC9’s first as they were older. But hindsight is 20/20, and who’s to say that NW or DL or AA or UA wouldn’t have bought them out later on.
Thanks for your kind words :) Yes I think I recall that article (or one very similar) which I came across when researching the video. It would have been very interesting had they gone with the A318 simply because of how it fell out of favour with pretty much everyone so quickly, would it have worked or would they have had to quickly scale up to the A319 or A320? As you said, the costs to introduce such a vastly different aircraft type would have been huge, perhaps had Airbus offered them some kind of sweetener they may have gone with the change...
@@ExpoAviation I have some notes on ME about that topic I can send you if you’d like
The airline never been Grounded
Well no, it was merged but an offshoot series called "Merged" would be a bit much. I've covered several other airlines which were just merged into others, I hope you enjoyed the show though :)
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It never merged omg u ppl are pathetic
@@ExpoAviationi😢 I think the proper term would be “murdered” by Republic
I swear, I tried really really hard to hear every word, but alas I just couldn’t. I’m sorry, but please please please - sharper diction, a much slower rate, varied phrasing, vocal inflection, and actual pauses between sentences. It comes across as a 30-minute long high-speed run-on sentence. :-(
Hi, thanks for editing that as it saved me a question. I did fear that this would be down to me talking too fast, I had a hard time trying not to rush but also not linger as I didn't want to make the episode too long, also why I shortened the gaps between sentences. It's duly noted though and I will try and take that on board for future episodes :)
@voiceimpression a bit harsh perhaps, I was speaking a bit too fast on this one and the autogenerated subtitles were hopeless with my Manc accent, that said I've put full subtitles in now :) Glad you enjoyed those stories, I think "my first day" is a lot funnier than the last ;)
You could just change the playback speed to suit your....slower gearing.
These executives were making big money but man they were stupid. The whole Republic thing and cutting out the leather seats. Also cutting out the high-class meals. A great business goal is to not piss off your customers and market yourself as something different than your competitors. But towards to the end, Midwest failed in both categories
Yep, they had a great thing going and then decided to remove all of the good aspects and then wonder why it started to go wrong, they weren't the first and sadly won't be the last geniuses to try it :/
@@ExpoAviation Must be they were drunk on their egos
@@ExpoAviation911 had something to do with it , too, when security wouldn’t even allow a butter knife in catering.