Northwest Airlines Creates New Corporate Communications And Brand Management Function

Northwest Airlines announced today that it is realigning its communications efforts and creating a new Corporate & Brand Communications function under the leadership of Mary Carroll Linder.

In announcing the new organization, CEO Richard Anderson said, “Clear and consistent communications about Northwest -- what we are, where we are going, and what our brand stands for – is absolutely critical to our success in informing our customers, employees, shareholders, and partners about the changes underway at Northwest Airlines.”

Linder, who becomes senior vice president-corporate & brand communications added, “In recent months, a top priority of Richard Anderson and our president, Doug Steenland, has been to communicate the airline’s new strategic direction to our internal and external audiences. The new function will allow us to combine efforts to better communicate how Northwest is striving to become the airline of choice for customers and employees alike.”

Corporate & Brand Communications will include the following areas: Advertising, Community Relations , Corporate Relations, Internal Communications , Media Relations, Sponsorships, and Visual & On-Board services.

Linder joined Northwest Airlines in January as senior vice president-corporate communications. Previously, she was senior vice president for global communications at The Estee Lauder Companies. Before joining Estee Lauder in 1996, Linder was based in London as the senior communications officer at Grand Metropolitan PLC (now Diageo).

With annual revenues in excess of $11 billion and more than 53,000 employees worldwide, Northwest Airlines is the world's fourth largest airline, with hubs at Detroit, Minneapolis/St. Paul, Memphis, Tokyo and Amsterdam and more than 2,700 daily departures. With its travel partners, Northwest serves more than 785 cities in 120 countries on six continents. Based on statistics compiled by the U.S. Department of Transportation, Northwest was the most on time U.S. airline among the seven largest network carriers for the period 1990-2000.