Leading Edge,
The term 'bears' was coined in the mid-1970s, originally during the jacket and module installation of the Piper and Claymore fields when there were hundreds of bears being shuttled by the venerable green BEAS 212s between the various floatels and other units such as laybarges, derrick barges, and jet barges.
The origin of the term was derived from at least three things. Mostly it was the ubiquitous fleece garments which everyone wore offshore, known as 'woolly bears'. This was reinforced as a result of a very popular Burt Reynolds chase film which referred to police helicopters as "bears in the air". Finally it was as result of the typically large, bulky, and often gruff personal bearing of many of the construction workers and drillers.
I know, and don't care, that it is politically incorrect to stereotypically characterise a large group of people,especially customers, with a single nickname. The term "bears" works because it is a very identifiable type of passenger, quite unlike any other group of civil airliner passengers that I can think of.
In the context of the topic of this thread, it is legitimate to use the term because bear behaviour in such matters is quite identifiable and even predictable.