Boeing's reputation has been stained by the 737 Max and it's going to have to fight to convince people the plane is safe
- The 737 Max is the best fastest-selling jet in Boeing's storied history.
- Now, its money-making airliner has tarnished the company's reputation with consumers.
- A poll conducted by Business Insider one week after the Ethiopian Airlines crash revealed that 53% of American adults would not want to fly on a Boeing 737 Max even after the FAA clears the aircraft for service.
- According to travel industry analyst Henry Harteveldt, Boeing needs to shift away from a business-to-business operation and towards one that interacts directly with consumers if it wants to allay fears.
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The 737 Max is the fastest-selling jet in Boeing's storied history. Since 2011, the Chicago-based aviation giant has taken roughly 5,000 orders for the latest generation of the venerable 737.
The various versions of the Boeing 737 currently account for 80% of Boeing's 5,800-plane order backlog.
It's been five months since the first Boeing 737 Max - Lion Air Flight JT610 - crashed off the coast of Indonesia and a month since Ethiopian Airlines Flight ET302 went down.
The entire 737 Max fleet is currently grounded as Boeing works to get a fix for the plane's control software issues certified by regulators.
"The 737 Max grounding and what we are learning from it shows that this is not the typical airplane accident we've seen in the past and this is not the typical airplane grounding we've seen recently," Henry Harteveldt, a long-time travel industry analyst, said to Business Insider in an interview. "This is a very serious problem for Boeing and a big problem for the airline operators and a problem I don't think will be easy to fix."
And it starts with Boeing's reputation which, at least in the short term, has been tarnished.
"The 737 Max has stained Boeing's brand reputation. This can't be denied," he said.
A poll conducted by Business Insider one week after the Ethiopian crash revealed that 53% of American adults would not want to fly on a Boeing 737 Max even after the US Federal Aviation Administration clears the aircraft for service.
"Boeing was a company that many people, even people who didn't fly, knew as being one of the best in American business because it had built such reliable products for so many years," Harteveldt, who is the founder Atmosphere Research Group, said.
In fact, "the 737, itself, had become a workhorse for airlines around the world," he added.
Now, Boeing needs to reassure the public that its planes are safe.
Boeing confirmed that the AOA sensor on the Ethiopian plane triggered MCAS just like it had done on Lion Air Flight JT610, which crashed on October 28 off the coast of Indonesia.
This is somewhat unfamiliar territory for Boeing.
Boeing aircraft have been grounded before. In 2013, the then-brand-new 787-8 Dreamliner was grounded for several months after its lithium-ion battery-powered electrical showed a tendency to catch fire. The aircraft was grounded by the FAA and then cleared for flight after Boeing came up with a redesign of the system.
The plane has gone on to be one of the popular long-haul airliners in the world with little to no stigma attached to it at all.
But things are different for the 737 Max. Most significantly the fact that 346 people are now dead due to crashes.
According to Harteveldt, Boeing's strategy must be two-fold. First, it has to convince airlines that they should continue to operate the 737 Max. The Boeing has to convince passengers and airline crew that its planes are the same safe products they've always known.
Regardless, Boeing must make that shift. It's got go from a B2B oriented business to one that speaks to the traveling public. And it will feel pressure from its airline customers to do so.
"The airlines are going to want Boeing to take steps to make the traveling public feel confident in Boeing aircraft," Harteveldt said.