The last thing the industry needs is a bunch of old guys with grey hair telling young millennials how cool it is. This approach is proven to not work. Airlines are not the only one trying to figure out the pilot shortage, this same problem plagues General Aviation as well and AOPA has already identified these kinds of ads depicting older aviators as not helpful.
Hey millennials, it's still fun and sometimes cool even. But when you're grey, assuming you got hair, chances are, you will spend at least some time thinking how nice it would be if you had just gone to dental school.
Maybe it's a clever ad. Seeing old geezers in the seat, a potential applicant will think: "They'll retire soon, and I'll move up fast!"; but seeing young pilots in the seat will signal: "I'll be stuck behind them for years."
If you see an old Piedmont Geezer you need to thank him! Those guys paved the way and fought hard for Regional contracts and Piedmont set the standard that all other regionals wanted. Contract workrules are probably 20 years old and still better then 80% of all other regional airlines.
Those old Geezer I got to fly with and those oldschool Geezers taught me a ton about aviation.
Only a bunch of entitled pricks would come on her making fun of them.
Anyone that's has flown a dash 8 for over 20 years and hasn't bent metal you can learn from.
My time and piedmont and flying with all these salty dogs has served me well.
This is a pointless thread. The truth is that there simply isn't many people in their 20's doing this anymore. It is time and cost prohibitive to them. Loans are not easy to come by anymore, like when I was given $100,000, no job or co-signer 10 years ago. For many, the ROI simply looks like it takes too long. When I was a CFI, it was quite a novelty to have a homegrown student...I had 2 in 6 years of teaching almost 80 students. Only 1 of the 2 was interested in the airlines. Not good...
Yea you really do see less Andes 20-something's making a career out of flying. Most of my students back in the day were 30+. They are the only ones who could afford it. And of those, only a small handful made it through commercial and cfi training. I'm sure the gap being created now will be felt 20 or 30 years from now, worse than the retirements we are currently seeing. And I'm sure automation will be the answer for the airlines.
I saw a couple of those Piedmont recruiting flyers ripped up in the Express crew room in PHL. I'm guessing someone at AWAC took exception to it.
That's quite alright, it won't be long before they can look out the window and see the 145s parked there. Not saying I'm thrilled but there is a wholly-owned plan going on and PHL is involved.
If you see an old Piedmont Geezer you need to thank him! Those guys paved the way and fought hard for Regional contracts and Piedmont set the standard that all other regionals wanted. Contract workrules are probably 20 years old and still better then 80% of all other regional airlines.
Those old Geezer I got to fly with and those oldschool Geezers taught me a ton about aviation.
Only a bunch of entitled pricks would come on her making fun of them.
Anyone that's has flown a dash 8 for over 20 years and hasn't bent metal you can learn from.
My time and piedmont and flying with all these salty dogs has served me well.
Oh stop. First off, no one really cares about all the good stuff you learned from the old guys. No one is entitled here either. We are pointing out that it's silly to sell movement and upgrades by putting an old man on the ad. That's like a sports car commercial having the car drive through a school zone or an AA ad showing the penalty box in O'Hare
02-21-2023
AIRLINE
; but seeing young pilots in the seat will signal: "I'll be stuck behind them for years."
