SEATTLE – On Thursday, Seattle-based Alaska Airlines and fashion designer Luly Yang will reveal a new custom uniform collection at an event inside the Alaska Airlines hangar at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport.
The audience will be 2,000 of the carrier’s employees. On stage, there will be 35 uniformed staff members showing off the new threads, including pilots, flight attendants, customer service agents, lounge workers and representatives from maintenance and tech.
Alaska employees last got new uniforms in 2011. Further, the launch of the airline’s new custom Luly Yang uniforms comes on the heels of the airline’s total brand refresh in January 2016 – the first in 25 years – and the ongoing integration of the Virgin America brand.
Alaska won’t share images of the uniform makeover until employees get their first look on Thursday.
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For now, the runway models and the 130 employees from Alaska, Virgin America and sister carrier Horizon who will spend 60 days “wear-testing” the various uniform pieces have been sworn to secrecy about any details.
“There’s a lot of curiosity and the employees tell me if someone asks what the uniforms look like they just say its pink with black polka dots,” said Yang, the Seattle designer well-known for her line of accessories, couture, bridal, cocktail and evening wear and ready-to-wear collections.
Yang is excited, but also tight-lipped about the specifics of the new collection. She will say that she believes employees will be pleased about all the pockets and that she’s especially proud of the pilot’s caps she’s designed for the collection. Overall, though, she’s confident the new uniforms will go a long way in bringing the Alaska and Virgin America cultures together.
“Virgin is seen as a brand that’s really innovative and fresh and new and energetic, with a lot of movement,” said Yang, “Alaska is seen as a very welcoming, approachable brand that very high touch and is all about service. You bring those two together and you have a perfect mix.”
Making a uniform collection that reflects those blended cultures was a challenging puzzle. But Yang and Alaska Airlines sought and received input during the multi-year project from focus groups, from thousands of employee surveys and from face-to-face meetings with the airline’s workers in many cities.
"This has been a collaborative effort with Alaska management and we believe the results will show it,” Jeffrey Peterson, Association of Flight Attendants-CWA President at Alaska Airlines, said to USA TODAY's Today in the Sky blog. He notes that, due in part to issues workers had with a previous iteration of uniforms, Alaska took proactive steps this time around to improve the safety and quality of the final product.
“It’s no secret that our last uniform roll-out was a challenge, said Ann Ardizzone, Alaska Airline’s Vice President of Supply Chain and Risk Management. “We learned some great lessons and we made the decision to lead with safety and quality regardless of time or expense.”
Ardizzone said the airline has been working closely with two partners who are industry leaders in the field of textile safety and quality: Unisync, which is one of the largest uniform suppliers in North America, and Oeko-Tex, whose independent Standard 100 certification program is globally recognized for fabric chemical testing.
“Typically, in a uniform program, you may hear that a garment passes some certification when it is complete, but we’re testing every single component at the supplier source before the garments are even made, from the threads and the buttons to the zippers and the fabrics,” said Ardizzone. “I’m confident we’ve done everything possible to make to make sure we have the most conservative and safe program.”
After Thursday’s uniform reveal at the Alaska Airlines hangar in Seattle and the 60-day "wear-testing" program, designer Yang and her team will take another round of feedback from employees – and passengers – and make any necessary changes. There will then be one more round of wear testing before the uniforms are produced, fit tours are conducted and the full collection is rolled out in airports and in the sky at the end of 2019.
Stay tuned ...
Harriet Baskas is a Seattle-based airports and aviation writer and USA TODAY Travel's "At the Airport" columnist. She frequently contributes to Ben Mutzabaugh's Today in the Sky blog. Follow her at @hbaskas.
