Mitchell Gant From Montserrat, joined Aug 2000, 250 posts, RR: 0 Reply 1, posted (9 years 3 months 3 weeks 3 days 21 hours ago) and read 2473 times:
The change occured in approximately 1984. A main reason for the change was to enlarge the "CONTINENTAL" titles so that it could be read easily from a distance. I am not sure why the meatball color was changed...I always thought the black meatball was classier.
The black ball did not make it on to any MD-80's or 737-300's, which is why I place the change around 1984. The red meatball will always be symbolic of the Frank Lorenzo era at CO. Some refer to it as the "scab ball" in reference to employees who crossed picket lines during the bitter union-Lorenzo battles of the 1980's.
Matt D From United States of America, joined Nov 1999, 9502 posts, RR: 51 Reply 2, posted (9 years 3 months 3 weeks 3 days 9 hours ago) and read 2281 times:
Luv2fly From United States of America, joined May 2003, 11957 posts, RR: 51 Reply 3, posted (9 years 3 months 3 weeks 3 days 9 hours ago) and read 2251 times:
Well in looking at the photos the red does look better to me....
Picarus From United States of America, joined Dec 2000, 298 posts, RR: 1 Reply 4, posted (9 years 3 months 3 weeks 3 days 9 hours ago) and read 2249 times:
The black always looked more visually appealing to me. I believe the actual color was changed becaues Uncle Frank wanted it that way...no other reason.
Gr8slvrflt From United States of America, joined Jan 2002, 1583 posts, RR: 16 Reply 5, posted (9 years 3 months 3 weeks 3 days 9 hours ago) and read 2191 times:
The joke going around at the time was the logo became red when the scab fell off!
DIA From United States of America, joined Jan 2001, 3273 posts, RR: 30 Reply 6, posted (9 years 3 months 3 weeks 3 days 9 hours ago) and read 2124 times:
To add on to what Mitchell Gant said above, yes, the change occured in 1984. Continental wanted to change the ball so that it would portray a "brighter" and "more friendly" image with uniformity. The final decision was to print the ball in the same red color as the one that is next to the CONTINENTAL title above the cheatline.
**For you trivia buffs: Many UAL employees at Stapleton wore a UA pin on their uniforms. The other side of these pins had a Continental "Golden Tail" with a screw through it. UA and CO were, to put it lightly, extremely competitive back at old Stapleton when Continental had a hub in Denver.
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EA CO AS From United States of America, joined Nov 2001, 12559 posts, RR: 64 Reply 7, posted (9 years 3 months 3 weeks 3 days 8 hours ago) and read 2020 times:
**For you trivia buffs: Many UAL employees at Stapleton wore a UA pin on their uniforms. The other side of these pins had a Continental "Golden Tail" with a screw through it. UA and CO were, to put it lightly, extremely competitive back at old Stapleton when Continental had a hub in Denver.
That's because UA played dirty pool when it came to competing with CO.
UA employees routinely approached customers in the queue for the CO ticket counter at DEN, asking them to have the CO agent endorse the ticket over and come fly UA instead. They'd lure them with free drink coupons, upgrades, etc.
On more than one occasion, UA's accounting department intentionally held off on billing CO for several months' worth of CO tickets they'd collected, hitting CO with tens of millions of dollars due at one time, trying to deplete their cash on hand. (It's the same as if your water company hiked your rate without your knowledge and then hit you with ten months' worth of excess fees at one time).
"In this present crisis, government is not the solution to our problem - government IS the problem." - Ronald Reagan
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