Lands' End Sued by More Delta Air Lines Employees over Uniforms | Hacker News Reader

Lands' End Sued by More Delta Air Lines Employees over Uniforms

bizjournals.com

42 pointsquotha19 comments

How is Delta not jumping on supporting their employees on this? They don't have much to lose by chastising a supplier, yet a lot to gain in service quality from people being comfortable at their job. It makes no sense from a business PoV... is Delta somehow profiting on these uniforms or what?

It mentions in the article that Delta investigated the issue:

> "Our top priority continues to be the safety of our employees, which is why we invested in a rigorous toxicology study to determine if there was a universal scientific issue with the uniform," Delta Air Lines (NYSE: DAL) said in a statement in response to the May lawsuit. "The results of the study confirm our uniforms meet the highest textile standards (OEKO-TEX) with the exception of the optional flight attendant apron, which we removed from the collection."

Delta took this seriously and commissioned a toxicology study. The results are that the clothing meets the highest textile standards. What should Delta do at this time?

The same issue happened to American Airlines and they eventually modified the uniforms. It sounds like testing in the lab didn't cover all the cases that ended up irritating a group of people.

Is there something about being a flight attendant that changes they way you use clothing? Does the air pressure do something? It seems odd that Lands End would run into such an issue when their whole business is making clothes.

I'm allergic to some dyes. The dyes are plainly non-toxic, but I can't wear them. I'm also allergic to dry cleaning solutions, so it sucks to be me.

Seems to me the issue isn't Land's End, which is making uniforms to spec. The issue is that Delta isn't accommodating employees with allergies.

> What should Delta do at this time?

Investigate more? I mean, apparently a whole bunch of their employees are indicating there's some sort of an issue with these uniforms. A few individuals might be a fluke, but at this point I expect Delta management to be concerned about this supplier damaging their employee performance and thus Delta's bottom line...

could it be specific vendors in charge of cleaning the uniforms or are employees required to clean them at home?

>I expect Delta management to be concerned about this supplier damaging their employee performance and thus Delta's bottom line...

there is no "Delta management". Like in any other typical BigCo the VP(s) responsible for supplies like uniforms is different from those VPs who may have any relationship with the employee performance. The supply VP gets his bonus based on KPIs like cost saving, thus the cheapest/etc. uniform even if that uniform causes issues to the employees and significantly impacts their performance. Their performance isn't in the supply VP bonus KPIs. Imagine yourself in the shoes of that poor supply VP - you can provide better uniforms and lose the millions of the bonus, or you can have the bonus ... So far it has been my observation that a VP always chooses his bonus and defends it to the last man standing. Even if some other (exceptional as such things almost never happen) VP tries to push the supply VP, the supply VP provides that "toxicology report meeting highest standards" and that is it, deal with your disgruntled capricious employees yourself.

Nice rant but you miss a very important fact: there is no way Land’s End is “the cheapest uniform” Delta could have selected.

B2B is different from B2C. With that being said, just checked their B2C site - for example a commodity like women jeans is $25-35 on the low end. The Land's End manufacturing seems to be mostly China, India, Mexico. It is hard to be cheapest than that.

I’ve been involved in purchasing reasonably large quantities of uniforms (because why not also stick facilities and other random stuff under IT so we can exercise our “purchasing acumen”).

Land’s End is mid-range in cost and quality as far as uniforms go. Especially compared with the super-cheap drop-ship-from-Vietnam vendors.

They're letting anyone affected go buy a new uniform of their choosing at whatever store they want at Delta's cost. I'd say that's absolutely doing right by their employees...

Reminds me of this, apparently engine oils get burnt and sucked into the bleed air that feeds cabins and is neurotoxic:

The 'asbestos of the airline industry' killing flyers | 60 Minutes Australia

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=D97No_7fbR4

Maybe it’s reacting with something in the uniforms? That way the uniforms by themselves would still pass toxicology testing

Two interesting links and an excerpt

https://www.nbcboston.com/news/local/delta-airlines-uniform-...

https://www.terrellhogan.com/terrell-hogan-representing-mult...

“Unveiled in May 2018, the purple uniforms – because of the chemical additives and finishes – were supposed to be wrinkle-free, stain-resistant, waterproof and fire retardant, according to Delta employees and information supplied by the airline.”

http://archive.md/9KpFo

lol its the 2020s now and we still dont know how to do clothing. WTH , we should already have a known set of fabrics and dyes that just work for any color or feel.

On the contrary clothing is getting better all the time. I shutter to think how terrible it must have been to try to walk through a cold rain 100 years ago, or engage in any kind of athletics under basically any circumstances.

Could also be mass hysteria

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_psychogenic_illness

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