Why Delta is the least respected brand in America

Delta is the least-respected brand in the world of business, beating out the likes of cigarette maker Philip Morris, says a survey by the research firm CoreBrand.

After looking at corporate brands that have been publicly traded for at least five years, CoreBrand determined the 100 brands with the greatest familiarity, then named those with the highest and lowest ratings from the survey. Cigarette smoke shop.

Coca-Cola and Pepsi tied for first; Delta was at the bottom of the pile, just edging out Philip Morris, Denny's, and Best Buy.

People's hate for Delta is well-documented online, on websites (NeverFlyDelta, DeltaReallySucks, and HateDelta are the first three that come up in Google), Facebook pages, and numerous comment threads on Yelp. Most complaints seem to focus on flight delays, poor service, and high luggage fees, but those are the same complaints that have been directed at the airline industry at large for years.

So how did Delta climb the ranks of suckiness to become the least respected of all?

Here are a few unique complaints against the airline:

It allegedly killed a catIn early 2011, Delta allegedly killed a woman's cat, then offered her the standard $50 lost luggage fee to make amends. Reports said the cat froze to death when a door latch malfunctioned in the cargo hold, exposed the poor guy to the cold.

It broke a vintage Gibson...
In January, the guitarist and singer for the Hanukkah-themed rock band The LeeVees was forced to check in his $10,000 vintage Gibson guitar on a flight from Buffalo, N.Y., to Detroit, Mich. When workers retrieved the luggage, the guitar got caught between the service elevator and a rail on the loading dock, causing damages to the bridge, neck, and tail that totaled almost $2,000.

...and Kenny Perry's lucky driver
Just this week, pro-golfer Kenny Perry said Delta broke his lucky driver, "the one I won all my tournaments with this year."

The golfer told The Seattle Times, "It broke the head right off the shaft. I’m very upset at this point."

“I represent Southwest Airlines and it’s in a Southwest (bag), and I flew Delta out here from New York and they snapped my driver. I’m pretty bummed out,” he said.

Sewing needles were found in their turkey sandwiches
The FBI opened an investigation into the airline last year when two passengers flying from Amsterdam to the U.S. found sewing needles in their turkey sandwiches. The airline stopped selling the sandwiches, which were assembled at Gate Gourmet's kitchens in Amsterdam. A search later uncovered two more needles. Delta now serves sealed prepackaged food on these flights as a precaution.

A quick Twitter search also reveals some strong anti-Delta sentiment, for varying reasons:

'No serious heart risks' linked to smoking cessation therapies

The American Heart Association claims that three different types of smoking cessation therapies do not pose serious heart risks, quashing concerns that certain products may increase the risks of heart attack, stroke or heart-related death.
Researchers looked at the results of 63 clinical trials involving 30, 508 people who were quitting smoking using either nicotine replacement gums and patches, the nicotine addiction treatment varenicline (Chantix), or taking the antidepressant bupropion (Wellbutrin), which can reduce cravings and other unwanted withdrawal effects.Doina cigarettes and Dunhill cigarettes.
The results, published in the journal Circulation, did not find evidence of any increased risk of serious heart events among participants.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimates that 45.3 million Americans smoke and that it accounts for approximately 443,000 deaths a year - that is one in every five deaths.
However, the CDC also notes that there are more former smokers in the US today than there are current ones.

Irregular or rapid heart rates

Stopping smoking is associated with increased life expectancy, improved cardiovascular health, better quality of life and reduced health care costs.
But, the CDC acknowledges, nicotine dependency is a chronic condition that may require repeated interventions to achieve the goal. Withdrawal symptoms for nicotine include irritability, anxiety, difficulty in concentrating and increased appetite.
Scientists know that nicotine replacement therapies, such as patches and chewing gum, increase minor heart symptoms, such as irregular or rapid heartbeat.
The combination of both therapies, wearing a patch and chewing gum whenever there is the urge to smoke has been shown to be more effective but does lead to more side effects.
Edward J. Mills, study co-author and associate professor of medicine at Stanford University and Canada Research Chair at the University of Ottawa, explains:

Not for any smoking ban

Although the proponents of banning smoking in bars and bingo halls would have us believe otherwise, what they are proposing is absolutely nothing other than expanded government dominance over individuals' lives.
Eliminating individual choice is certainly nothing new, but the claim that that's not what is being proposed now is simply not true. Arguments put forth by the proponents are contradictory.
They argue on the one hand that "studies have shown" that banning smoking in bars will increase the number of patrons, but on the other hand argue that all three local government entities have to ban smoking or none of the ordinances will take effect so as to not "give a competitive advantage" to some bars.
If the "studies" were right, that would be the last thing that would happen.
Also, if the "studies" were correct, why does it fall to government to ban smoking? Wouldn't an entrepreneurial bar owner realize that there was an unsatisfied demand for a smoke-free bar and open one voluntarily? Can anyone actually cite one of those "studies"?
Several articles and letters to the editor have talked about the "studies" but I have yet to see a citation. I'm beginning to wonder if the "studies" actually exist or if proponents simply think if they repeat those statements often enough people will just believe them.
Finally, much is being made about "protecting" the employees. The last time I checked, no one is forced to work anywhere. If someone didn't want to work in an environment where there is smoking, they could quit. But wait! Why would someone who was bothered by smoking apply for a job in a bar in the first place?
I urge all three local governments to reject the proposal and allow individuals to live their lives the way they see fit.

Smoking fans flames of memories

The subject of smoking keeps coming up in conversations lately, and it’s funny how times have changed.
My mother and I were taking a tour of Clarksville, where our family lived for one year when I was a teenager.
When we drove by the high school where Mom taught, she pointed out where she had smoking-pit duty.
I asked Mom if she smoked with the students. She told me no; she smoked in the teachers’ lounge.
When another teacher complained, the principal (also a smoker), told the teacher he could work in his classroom, but Mom couldn’t smoke in hers, so tough, basically.
Wow. The outcry that would happen today if someone lit up in the lounge.
Once when my brother was a little boy, he asked Mom if one of his beloved elementary teachers, Mrs. Howard, smoked.
Mom said, “I don’t think so.”Glamour cigarettes.
Shane said: “I didn’t think she was that kind of woman.”
I’m not sure what that meant in his little mind, but his mother apparently was.
Last weekend, my brother recalled that he had bought cigarettes for Mom, and I remember running in the store to get them, too.
I also volunteered to buy them when having a bunking party with some friends, and we smoked the cigarettes under a bridge. We sprayed perfume and everything aerosol we could find when we got back to the girl’s house — it was a daring thing for me, a future goody-two-shoes.
Of course, there were cigarette vending machines, where anybody with some change could buy a pack. My kids were pretty incredulous that those ever existed.
I also remember Mom giving me a lighted cigarette to light fireworks, and I’d steal a puff.
(Mom quit cold turkey about 30 years ago, by the way. She has apologized for the trips with cracked windows and the ensuing allergy headaches my brother and I got from the smoke.)
My husband said that when he was in high school, his band director smoked like a chimney. When the high school band was selected as the Bicentennial Band of Arkansas and got to play at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C. (one of my husband’s proudest lifetime achievements), the students rode in three buses, with one designated for the students and chaperones who smoked.
When they made a pit stop, the doors to the one bus would open, and smoke would roll out like a five-alarm fire.
In college, I didn’t have many friends who smoked, but people could smoke in their dorm rooms, and just about anywhere except the classroom.
When I got my first newspaper job, smoking went with the stressful job. I didn’t smoke, except second hand.
The clouds of smoke hung above the short walls dividing the departments. My husband and I would go home reeking of smoke. I hated having my hair smell like smoke, and I developed an attractive habit of obsessively pulling my hair to my nose to smell it.
I also bought a battery-operated ash tray for the worst offender in the office, which helped, until the batteries died and she didn’t replace them.
One editor had a cigarette going nonstop, sometimes two, if he forgot, which was often.
My husband and I were thrilled with the prospect of working in a nonsmoking newsroom when we came to Conway. (My hair-sniffing habit died down, too.)
Nobody in my immediate family smokes now, but my mother does not deny how much she loved it back in the day.
When we toured the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art in Bentonville a few weekends ago, we saw a piece called Smoker #9, a woman’s hand holding a cigarette to giant red lips, exhaling smoke.
My mom posed and mimicked holding a cigarette to her lips.
I’ll bet Mrs. Howard never would have done that, but Shane, I hate to tell you. Mom was trying to protect your young innocence.
Mrs. Howard was a smoker.

Domestic cigarette sales drop

BAT Zimbabwe’s cigarette sales volumes declined by 16% in the first half of the year ended June 30 2013, compared to the same period last year.
This was experienced across most of the company’s brands such as Dunhill, Newbury, Everest, Kingsgate and Berkeley.
Company chairman, Kennedy Mandevhani said BAT Zimbabwe’s prime brand, Madison, proved more resilient on the market.
“Successive increases in excise duty which impacted cigarette retail prices in 2011 and 2012 have been compounded by coinage constraints, resulting in consumers often paying higher prices than recommended by manufacturers simply due to the unavailability of coins,” he said. Classic cigarettes.
Mandevhani said industry cigarette volumes had reduced as a result of the slowdown in GDP growth, and the ongoing general affordability challenges that consumers in the country continue to face.
“Total revenues were US$23,1 million for the first six months of the year…mainly due to manufacturer increases net of excise on key brands in December 2012, which offset on part the impact of lower sales volumes,” he said.
Mandevhani said the economy showed signs of stagnation in the first half of this year. He said despite limited growth being achieved in the agricultural and mining sectors, investment in the economy has been constrained by domestic liquidity challenges and restricted availability of external credit lines.
One of the company’s highest expenses was the provision for a share-based payment expense of US$10 606 000 as part of compliance with indigenisation laws.
“On a non adjusted basis, operating profit reduced to US$2,4 million, as a result of an IFRS 2 share based payment expense of US$10,6 million.
“This expense represents the fair value of share awards made to employees by our Employee Share Ownership Trust as part of the company’s compliance with Indigenisation and Economic Empowerment legislation plus the associated payment of dividends to employees participating in the trust of US$0,4 million,” he said.

Another Risk for Babies of Smoking Moms

Women have been told it's important not to smoke while they're pregnant. Some women may not realize how much smoking in pregnancy might affect their children later on.
A recent study found that children may be more likely to catch an infectious disease requiring hospitalization in their first year if their mothers smoked during pregnancy.
In fact, children born to mothers who smoked during pregnancy were at higher risk for dying from an infectious disease than children born to non-smokers.
The most common types of infectious diseases among children born to smokers were respiratory illnesses, but the babies were affected by other diseases as well.
This study, led by Michael J. Metzger, PhD, of the University of Washington in Seattle, looked at whether mothers' smoking during pregnancy increased children's risk for infectious diseases later.
The researchers compared two sets of children, each including a group of babies born to smokers and a group of babies born to non-smokers. The children were all born in Washington between 1987 and 2004.
First, the researchers compared 47,404 babies who had been hospitalized with an infectious disease within their first year of life to 48,233 babies who were not hospitalized with an infectious disease before age 1.
In their second analysis, the researchers compared 627 babies who died from an infectious disease in their first year to 2,730 babies who survived their first year.
In both groups, the researchers found that babies born to mothers who smoked during pregnancy had 1.5 times greater odds of being hospitalized for or of dying from an infectious disease than children not born to smoking moms. Kent Convertibles cigarettes.
In particular, babies born to mothers who smoked during pregnancy had 1.7 times greater odds of being hospitalized for a respiratory infectious disease than babies born to non-smokers.
When the researchers took into account differences in the babies' birthweight and the pregnancy week when they were born, it did not affect the results of hospitalization risk.
Interestingly, however, when the researchers looked only at children with low birthweight, children born to smokers were no more or less likely to die from an infectious disease than children born to non-smokers.
Overall, however, the researchers concluded that smoking during pregnancy was linked to a higher risk of a wide range of infectious diseases among the babies after they were born.
"These findings suggest that full-term infants of normal weight whose mothers smoked may suffer an increased risk of serious infectious disease morbidity and mortality," the researchers concluded.
“We’ve known for a long time that babies born to mothers who smoke during pregnancy are at high risk for serious medical problems relating to low birth weight, premature delivery and poor lung development,” said study co-author Abigail Halperin, MD, MPH, in a prepared statement.
“While respiratory infections have been recognized as a common cause of these sometimes life-threatening illnesses, this study shows that babies exposed to smoke in utero also have increased risk for hospitalization and death from a much broader range of infections—both respiratory and non-respiratory—than we knew before," she said.
Andre Hall, MD, an OBGYN at Birth and Women's Care, PA in Fayetteville, NC, said it's not news that smoking is an unhealthy habit.
"It is also generally understood that it is especially unhealthy for pregnant women and their unborn children," he said.
"In addition to problems such as intrauterine growth restriction, this study now suggests a link between a mother's smoking and the future development of infectious diseases in an unborn child," Dr. Hall said. "This attack on a developing child's immune system which may increase a child's diseases over their lifetime, should be avoided at all costs."
This study will be presented October 27 at the American Academy of Pediatrics National Conference and Exhibition in Orlando.
This study has not yet been published in a peer-reviewed journal, and its findings should be interpreted with caution.
Information was unavailable regarding funding and possible conflicts of interest among the authors.

Study: Flavored small cigars are popular with kids

Small cigars flavored to taste like candy or fruit are popular among teens, according to the first government study to gauge their use.
About 1 in 30 middle and high school kids said they smoke the compact, sweet-flavored cigars. The percentages rise as kids get older, to nearly 1 in 12 high school seniors, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported.
The results - based on a 2011 survey of nearly 19,000 students, grades 6 through 12 - were published online Tuesday by the Journal of Adolescent Health.
Since 2009, the government has banned cigarettes with candy, fruit and clove flavoring, though it continued to allow menthol flavoring. There is no restriction on sales of cigars with such flavorings except in Maine, New York City and Providence, R.I.
The sale of cigarettes and cigars to those under 18 is illegal, but according to an earlier CDC report, about 16 percent of high school students were smokers in 2011.
Health officials say sweet flavoring can mask the harsh taste of tobacco and make smoking more palatable.
"The so-called small cigars look like cigarettes, addict as much as cigarettes and they kill like cigarettes," said CDC Director Dr. Tom Frieden.
Tobacco companies have said they oppose smoking by those under age 18. But the marketing of flavored cigars suggests companies are trying to interest kids in smoking, Frieden and others said.
"The tobacco industry has a long history of using flavored products to attract kids," said Danny McGoldrick, of the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids, a Washington, D.C.-based advocacy and research organization.
Sales of regular and flavored cigars have boomed in the last 12 years, from 6 billion to more than 13 billion annually, according to calculations by his group.
The CDC survey also asked about menthol-flavored cigarettes. When those were included, more than 40 percent of kids who were current smokers in the survey said they were using flavored cigars or cigarettes.