whatkindoffreshhell
Veteran
Notice Seth's career path: radio station announcer to dj to revenue management at a major airline.
Seems about right. Yeah.
Seems about right. Yeah.
Seth Has His Own Website!
- Thread starter ringmaruf
- Start date
Prince of PAWOBs
Veteran
golden1 said:
I started laughing so hard at this post that I think my son woke up and thought that I had lost my mind.
AtlanticBeach said:
So GoFares routes flew more passengers than the rest of the system in July, but with no additional revenue? Am I interpreting that correctly?
I'd like to see GoFares routes performance compared to those same routes last year sans GoFares.
I agree that getting the revenue managment mix correct with a new fare structure will take some time, however I still believe that GoFares are too simple of a structure for the type of airline that is US Airways.
A couple of things strike me in this thread.
(1) The comparison between WN flying 350 miles for a $96 walk-up fare between OKC and MCI and a similar route US flies in the NE is comparing an apple and an orange. That drive is probably less than 5 actual hours as the posted speeds are probably 70 on a good amount of it through the mostly rural stretch, meaning you are probably doing closer to 80. Combined with rather small population bases, you need to charge a lower fare to stimulate traffic. Compare that to say, PHL-BOS, which is actually a bit shorter, but the larger populations and the fact the drive would be much more unbearable are going to give you a higher demand anyway and drive it's own demand.
(2) Much has also been made of the of the issue of no seat assignments, etc. on WN. I think it goes deeper than that. As Piney commented on, the fact US can interline you is a big factor when things go wrong. The seat assignment issue is more than just do I get a window or an aisle as well.
If you are going anywhere of distance on WN, although so much service is point to point, there is a good chance you are going to connect somewhere like MDW or BWI, although not the triple hop across the country like a few years ago. Just watch an episode of A & E's "Airline" and you will see most of the true problems are people connecting (Not counting the drunks). An episode a couple of weeks ago had a family of 5 returning from FLL to BUF, connecting in BWI. THe first leg was direct FLL-JAX-BWI. Then a connection to another flight BWI-BUF. The aircraft was late JAX-BWI, so when the family got there, there were only 4 seats open. While debating what to do, the agent gave another boarding card away so there were only 3 seats. Keep in mind this family has checked in with a confirmed ticket and arrived at the gate more than 10 minutes prior to departure. At U, if they already have their seat assignments there is no issue. On WN, even though the family was confirmed, and could not get on the flight completely due to the fact WN was late (they did nothing wrong), they got an 11 hour overnight drive to BUF so the father could be at work and the kids in school the next day. I thought to myself, "If they had only booked on U, they would be on a plane and not dealing with this night to save a few bucks".
(1) The comparison between WN flying 350 miles for a $96 walk-up fare between OKC and MCI and a similar route US flies in the NE is comparing an apple and an orange. That drive is probably less than 5 actual hours as the posted speeds are probably 70 on a good amount of it through the mostly rural stretch, meaning you are probably doing closer to 80. Combined with rather small population bases, you need to charge a lower fare to stimulate traffic. Compare that to say, PHL-BOS, which is actually a bit shorter, but the larger populations and the fact the drive would be much more unbearable are going to give you a higher demand anyway and drive it's own demand.
(2) Much has also been made of the of the issue of no seat assignments, etc. on WN. I think it goes deeper than that. As Piney commented on, the fact US can interline you is a big factor when things go wrong. The seat assignment issue is more than just do I get a window or an aisle as well.
If you are going anywhere of distance on WN, although so much service is point to point, there is a good chance you are going to connect somewhere like MDW or BWI, although not the triple hop across the country like a few years ago. Just watch an episode of A & E's "Airline" and you will see most of the true problems are people connecting (Not counting the drunks). An episode a couple of weeks ago had a family of 5 returning from FLL to BUF, connecting in BWI. THe first leg was direct FLL-JAX-BWI. Then a connection to another flight BWI-BUF. The aircraft was late JAX-BWI, so when the family got there, there were only 4 seats open. While debating what to do, the agent gave another boarding card away so there were only 3 seats. Keep in mind this family has checked in with a confirmed ticket and arrived at the gate more than 10 minutes prior to departure. At U, if they already have their seat assignments there is no issue. On WN, even though the family was confirmed, and could not get on the flight completely due to the fact WN was late (they did nothing wrong), they got an 11 hour overnight drive to BUF so the father could be at work and the kids in school the next day. I thought to myself, "If they had only booked on U, they would be on a plane and not dealing with this night to save a few bucks".
Oh puhleeze. If US had a massive sex discrimination case, you'd still fly them. They have a pretty significant lawsuit pending regarding outsourced maintenance, in case you forgot. And you still fly them.PineyBob said:
Look, I've got nothing against your choice of air carrier. But don't feed us the crap about it being based on some sort of social conscience.
I, for one, am not buying.I know a few things about you, all supplied by you. Among them are that you choose to patronize a company that you agree has mistreated its employees profoundly (like Wal-Mart), while disparaging its competitor who has extraordinarily high employee satisfaction and much higher wages.PineyBob said:
As you said, you do it because you like the service. There's nothing wrong with that. I've nothing to say about your personal choices. It's just that when you start to talk about choosing to fly US Airways because of some sort of ethical superiority my BS meter goes off the scale.
CynicalResAgent
Veteran
PITbull said:
You just proved you can give more in wage concessions. Being able to choose between cost and covenience is a perk that in the future will only be avaiable to members of management.
Ok back to Seth I just had a horrible thought.... We have those USAirways.com special paint jobs, could someone imagine if they made a yellow Gofares paint scheme and painted a few planes with Seths crazy mug on the tail?????
KCFlyer
Veteran
- Aug 20, 2002
- 11,322
- 1,427
N628AU said:
You are making a couple of assumptions with that thought...
Assumption #1 - US doesn't overbook any flights, especially one that would be the last flight out that night. Even with an assigned seat and a boarding card, if a flight is oversold and Customer X checks at the counter while Customer Y is deplaning several gates down, customer X most likely gets the seat. Whether a seat is assigned or not, an overbooked flight is an overbooked flight. Most every airline does it (I understand that JetBlue does not)...I've seen it myself on a Delta flight from MCI-DFW....Everybody showed up for the flight, preassigned seats in hand, only to find that the flight was oversold and they needed volunteers to give up their seats.
Assumption number 2 - in all the threads about SWA in PHL, there are constant references to delays in and out of PHL. What happens on a U flight if the connecting PHL-BUF flight is at the gate, and the arriving U flight is in a holding pattern because of a ground stop in PHL...after all, from reading the threads about how PHL will be the death of SWA's turn times, it sounds far more likely that a flight would be late to arrive in PHL than it would be arriving at BWI. If it's the last flight of the night, what would U do to get the father and kids home so that they could get to work and school the next day? Bear in mind that this being the last flight of the day, using the interlining opportunity on another airline would be highly unlikely.
There's risks involved in every aspect of travel. That's one reason why I won't book myself on any flight (especially the connecting one) that is the last one of the day. Especially if I MUST be somewhere the next day.
Also, Airline was taped before "thru checkin" was started on Southwest...I would bet today that when that family checked in in FLL, they were also checked in on the BWI-BUF flight. Making that episode on Airline a non-issue.
Whatnow?
Veteran
- Nov 4, 2003
- 862
- 8
I finally saw this "Seth" person for the first time on the local Philly news this AM 
I'm totally embarrased! OMG, couldn't those genious, but wonderful people we have in Marketing come up with a better campaign than this! This guy is a total embarrasment! How cheezy is this! :down:
US1YFARE
Veteran
- Mar 31, 2004
- 3,932
- 54
Whatnow? said:
[post="167865"][/post]
At least US is getting better publicity in PHL. It is nice to see US getting promoted in PHL media rather than WN. Until recently, you only read about how US gouges travelers. No matter how embarrassing you think Seth is, people are starting to think of US as a carrier who offers low fares. When WN arrived in PHL, people said, US no more. Now, they are starting to realize that they have a real choice and US offers more than WN (frequency, seat assignments, FC).
ClueByFour
Veteran
- Aug 20, 2002
- 3,566
- 37
US1YFARE said:
I'm not going to debate the latter point, since US does offer things that WN does not.
I do take issue with "people are starting to think of US as a carrier who offers low fares." People are not that stupid. Can I look to see the PIT-PHL GoFare?
PHL-ISP?
PHL-anywhere that an LCC does not serve?
GoFares=match the LCCs. Seth does not change that. Seth is hype, in a rather transparent attempt to get free plugs on the evening news.
PITbull said:
I don't think that ELP's point was to always shop for the cheapest product, even if that means additional inconvenience. Rather, the point is what you said in bold (my emphasis) above. If the Giant Eagle charged three times as much for milk as Wal-Mart, would you buy milk there? What if they charged ten times as much unless you reserved it two weeks in advance and agreed to pick it up on Tuesday evening? Wal-Mart's philosophy is not to simply charge more because they can -- and customers appreciate that. When I buy something at Wal-Mart, I don't feel like I was cheated, since they are generally close to the lowest price.
To go with the gas analogy, when I visit my relatives in New York (driving from Boston), I *always* fill up before leaving Massachusetts, since I know (in spite of the Taxachusetts reputation) that gasoline is less expensive here by 15-25 cents per gallon. If I get stuck buying gas in NY or CT, I only buy enough to get me to Mass. with a bit to spare just in case. The same is true for air travel -- I purchase more of it when I feel the price is more reasonable.
What do you consider a reasonable premium for convenience? 10%? 25%? 400%? Why is the lowest-priced PHL-ALB flight five times as expensive as the lowest-priced PHL-BDL flight?
N628AU said:
Well, no, it really isn't, unless the "apples-to-oranges comparison is between an advance purchase and a walk-up fare. Take PHL-PIT, which is basically all highway and conservatively takes a bit under 5 hours without too much traffic. The least-expensive possible fare is $97 each way, and the walk-up is $335 each way.
And you miss the point that Southwest's business model is to stimulate traffic to fill the capacity -- the more capacity they offer, the lower their unit costs. It's crazy that both BWI-MHT and BWI-PVD had more traffic (each) a year ago than BOS-PHL. BOS-BUF is a long, boring drive -- it should have more demand than BWI-ORF, but it doesn't. And the sad thing is that "reasonable" fares on many of those routes would still have yields in the 25-40 cent/mile range. Instead, the airline tries to make up for those $49 fares to Florida by charging insane fares on other routes.
