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The new Braniff will again square off against prosperous American, which last week announced that it will begin taking delivery next year of at least 67 new McDonnell Douglas twin-jet airliners. The 142-passenger DC-9 Super 80s are part of a major American expansion drive. The carrier also plans an aggressive program to cut costs and keep ticket prices low. Renewed fare wars and an economic downturn could hurt Braniff, but owning an airline has long been one of Pritzker's ambitions and he intends to stick by the venture. Says he: "I've always flirted with airplanes. It's an exciting thing."
Other companies on the recovery list:
Pan American. C. Edward Acker, 54, once the risk-taking boss of Air Florida, was so convinced that he could turn around Pan American World Airways that he made a daring bet. If the airline failed to make money on its 1983 operations, Acker would forgo his chairman's salary of $475,000. Acker won his bet. Pan Am had a slim operating profit of $52.4 million last year, vs. a loss of $314.5 million in 1982. Predicts Acker: "We will continue to improve service by every means possible. We are going to move forward with even stronger results in the coming year."
Analysts have heard rosy projections from Pan Am before and have had reasons to discount them. Big, cumbersome and overextended, the once powerful airline seemed on the verge of crashing for a decade. As far back as 1974, when it had about $850 million in debt, the airline held preliminary meetings with bankruptcy lawyers. Everything Pan Am did to make things better only seemed to make them worse. To raise money, it was forced to sell its 59-story Manhattan office headquarters. It bought National Airlines at the exorbitant price of $450 million in 1980, after a furious bidding war with Eastern and Texas International Airlines, but then ran into difficulty meshing National's domestic routes with its own international runs.
In 1981 Pan Am's directors hired Acker, believing that his skill at turning Air Florida from a small intrastate carrier into a profitable, regional airline was just what Pan Am needed. Acker swiftly integrated the staffs of Pan Am and National and restructured the airline's routes, dropping some cities but adding 24 more. He got rid of money-losing air freighters and put fuel-efficient Boeing 737s on flights in Europe. Pan Am's remaining 28,000 employees (vs. 36,000 in 1980) were persuaded to take a 10% pay cut. Meanwhile, the airline poured $25 million into upgrading its fleet of 747s and adding other goodies to lure paying passengers: fancy wines and champagne (including Dom Perignon on some flights), caviar in first class on long hauls and better food in general. Also planned: a $20 million refurbishing of Pan Am's Worldport terminal at New York City's Kennedy Airport and $40 million for improvements at its facility at Los Angeles International.