Tech Cocktail Now Flying On American Airlines

Frank Gruber Nov 7, 2012 Tweet

As a media company that hosts networking and educational events in more than 30 cities across the United States and internationally, we have partnered with American Airlines to alleviate Tech Cocktail’s travel costs. The  partnership was inked in August and the Tech Cocktail team has been traveling from coast-to-coast on American Airlines ever since. Having played host to hundreds of events across the country over the last six years, I know first hand how crucial flying a reliable airline is to running a business. Teaming with American Airlines is the ideal partnership for our startup lifestyle. We are excited to be working with American Airlines and leveraging their BusinessExtrAA services geared towards tech-savvy business travelers like us.

From a technology perspective I can honestly say that I’ve gotten more work done on American Airlines flights over the last few months than any other airline the rest of the year. The inflight wifi powered by Gogo has been available on almost every flight and has been helpful in maintaining my productivity. The American Airlines iPhone app has also made keeping track of my flights a breeze. It even offers some of the latest iOS 5 features like Passbook which adds your boarding pass for easy access without having to unlock your entire iPhone.

Aside from flying we also teamed with American Airlines to help some lucky startups and small businesses gain access to free flights as part of the Flights. Camera. Action. video contest. The contest, which ran from July till October, helped some lucky businesses with a top prize worth 160,000 BusinessExtrAA points (redeemable for up to 80 flights). I was honored to be one of the judges for the contest who reviewed the most popular choices. The winners of the contest were announced at the Inc 500/5000 in Phoenix in early October. We are excited to share the winners below:

• Grand Prize - Convoy of Hope for this video.
• First Place Startup – Sanergy for this video
• First Place Established Business – The Playmakers for this video
• First Place Non-Profit – Convoy of Hope (also Grand Prize winner)

Finally, teaming with American Airlines we are on the look-out for ways to help your startup or small business make the connections you need to be successful. Whether it be a flight to an important investor meeting or a flight to meet with your most important client, Tech Cocktail and American Airlines want to help with random acts of flight. In fact, we offered our first random act of flight to Washington, D.C. based Umba Box as they recently needed to meet with an important potential investor on their bootstrapped budget. American Airlines and Tech Cocktail jumped in with free flights for the two UmbaBox team members. Stay tuned as we will be looking to do the same for other teams in the future.

American Airlines will participate in our events around the country including Sessions speaker events and Startup Showcase & Mixer events.