Webcast Thoughts?!?

[matika]

He mentioned Southwest so many times I thought I was going to scream. "We can't let Southwest destroy us," blah blah blah.

He makes it sound like it will be Southwest's fault if US goes under, they ARE the enemy, etc.

While it doesn't help matters much with them moving into Philly, all I can really say is:

The problem ain't Southwest.

<_<

 

[cltvff]

I agree.. I have looked and seen nothing to support this statement.

YOU DON'T THINK DAVE LIED AGIAN DO YOU WELL DO YOU?

I think that would have made the news..............................

I believe the announcement of additional PHL flying is going to be made today.

 

[pit_needs_help]

I will wait to hear what we are facing before making any decisions but think about six cents cost. We will still have a hybrid operation with point-to-point flying and hubs. Hubs are expensive and WN doesnt even have costs that low. It will be a tough sell even if he comes out with more details and cheering the groups onward. I would think 7.5 cents would be realistic to compete under the type of operation we foresee?

 

[sfb]

Wrong!

Go to WN's web page, no announcement, go to Yahoo's Airline News page, no announcement of WN adding PHL flights.

Those are facts!

Dave lied again!

What seems to have happened is that Southwest's new flights were probably loaded into some computer system yesterday (are they sending schedules to ARC again?) and will be officially announced today. According to the Philadelphia Inquirer, the man who "wants your jobs" (Herb, according to Dave) will be in Philly today announcing additional service, including flights to LAX, HOU, MSY, FLL, PBI, RDU, and MHT. Actually, what he really wants are some of your customers and a lot of the people who simply don't travel or choose to drive due to high fares. A lot more folks would fly US to RDU, for example, if the walk-up fare were $99 instead of nearly $500.

Here's the official news release for the new Southwest service at PHL.

 

[ITRADE]

Wrong!

Go to WN's web page, no announcement, go to Yahoo's Airline News page, no announcement of WN adding PHL flights.

Those are facts!

Dave lied again!

700UW, you really, really need to stop and being such a conspiracy theorist.

Southwest Airlines Announces More Flights for Philadelphia; Aggressive Expansion Planned This Summer

Care to amend your blatantly inaccurate statement?

 

[ITRADE]

I agree.. I have looked and seen nothing to support this statement.

YOU DON'T THINK DAVE LIED AGIAN DO YOU WELL DO YOU?

I think that would have made the news..............................

You too Doc. Care to retract your comment?

 

[funguy2]

1. Siegel seems to be genuinely interested in saving the airline. I would say he pulled no punches, gave the brutal facts as they should have been given and did not attempt to sugar coat anything. It can all be done, but everyone is going to bleed at once.

El Gato:

I would disagree with your assessment #1. These are the same brutal facts facing this company 2.5 years ago prior to bankruptcy. Yet, no changes other than employee concessions were made. Not one. So, if Dave is sincerely interested in saving the company, he clearly has no idea how to do it. While all of US Airways problems did not begin with Dave, he did nothing to change it. Among the things he did not do:

~ Deal with PIT hub profitability issue
(However, this was a major 3 month distraction)
~ Deal with fleet rationalization (made it worse w/ EMBRAER order)
~ Deal with LCC encroachment

 

[RATBOY]

POST DELETED

<YOU STATED THE SAME THING - VERBATIM - IN ANOTHER THREAD. POR QUA?>

 

[usfliboi]

Wrong!

Go to WN's web page, no announcement, go to Yahoo's Airline News page, no announcement of WN adding PHL flights.

Those are facts!

Dave lied again!

Your response 700??????????? Who lied? Who spoke without facts in place?

 

[BoeingBoy]

ITRADE and usfliboi,

I guess we're in one of those "depends on what the definition of is is" situations.

3/24/04 in the a.m. Dave announces that LUV has ANNOUNCED additional PHL flts.

3/25/04 1:00pm LUV press release issued actually ANNOUNCING additional PHL flts with Herb making actual ANNOUNCEMENT in the a.m.l

Now, did Dave know the announcement was coming - probably so. Was what Dave said technically correct - no.

Spin it any way you want. All that really matters is that LUV is going to grow aggressively over the summer in PHL.

Jim

 

[MarkMyWords]

Wrong!

Go to WN's web page, no announcement, go to Yahoo's Airline News page, no announcement of WN adding PHL flights.

Those are facts!

Dave lied again!

Care to take back this statement? 7 new markets will be added with 14 additional flights.

 

[cltvff]

Spin it any way you want. All that really matters is that LUV is going to grow aggressively over the summer in PHL.

Jim

Bingo, and PHL is where the rubber is gonna meet the road . Isn't PHL what this is all about anyway? US competes effectively against WN or kisses all the revenue from the "Jewel" buh bye

 

[BoeingBoy]

MmW,

Look at the time the post you quoted was posted and tell me what part of it is not factual - except the part about Dave lying as I discussed above.

If I say the sun is rising at my location at 8 pm tonight and you tell me I am wrong, I can't come back tomorrow morning as the sun rises and tell you I was right.

Jim

 

[ITRADE]

3/24/04 in the a.m. Dave announces that LUV has ANNOUNCED additional PHL flts.

How did Dave know then? Certainly Dave isn't going to be privy to info from Southwest for purposes of a webcast. So, there had to be some public source.

3/25/04 1:00pm LUV press release issued actually ANNOUNCING additional PHL flts with Herb making actual ANNOUNCEMENT in the a.m.l

Oh, a press release is the only type of announcement? OK. Whatever.

Now, did Dave know the announcement was coming - probably so. Was what Dave said technically correct - no.

True, the point is irrelevant. The fact of the matter is that Dave poined out that WN was adding x number of flights - which WN did announce. 700UW and the rest of the zealots were hysterically claiming that it was a lie that there was going to be an addition. So, to borrow an image from Delldude:

 

[sfb]

Wrong!

Go to WN's web page, no announcement, go to Yahoo's Airline News page, no announcement of WN adding PHL flights.

Those are facts!

Dave lied again!

700UW, you really, really need to stop and being such a conspiracy theorist.

Southwest Airlines Announces More Flights for Philadelphia; Aggressive Expansion Planned This Summer

Care to amend your blatantly inaccurate statement?

Actually, at the time 700UW made his post, there had been no public announcement of the new flights by WN via their web page or PR Newswire (which is what would have gotten into Yahoo's Airline News page). Siegel wasn't lying either, but he was making a statement based on information which was unavailable to the general public at the time; after all, the Philly Inquirer must have known last night since the new destinations were in this morning's paper (and LUV made the announcement at 1 PM EST). It might have been more accurate for Siegel to say "Southwest is about to announce..."

In any case, it seems a bit disingenuous to claim that the LCC threat, and specifically Southwest attacking a hub, is something new. To quote USAir Group's 10-K filing for 1993, filed exactly ten years ago today:

As discussed in greater detail in "Management's Discussion and
Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations," the
dramatic expansion of low fare competitive service in many of
USAir's markets in the eastern U.S. during the first quarter of
1994 and USAir's competitive response in February 1994 by reducing
its fares up to 70 percent in those markets and other affected
markets in order to preserve its market share led the Company to
announce that it expected to experience greater losses in 1994 than
it experienced in 1993.

In September 1993, Southwest Airlines, Inc. ("Southwest"), a
low cost, low fare, "no frills" air carrier which had not previous-
ly provided service to or in the eastern U.S., inaugurated service
to Chicago and Cleveland from Baltimore/ Washington International
Airport ("BWI") at fares substantially below those previously
offered by USAir and other airlines in the same markets. BWI is
one of USAir's hub airports. Unlike the other major U.S. air
carriers, Southwest does not structure its operations around
connecting hub airports, relying instead on high frequency point-
to-point service. USAir responded by matching most of Southwest's
fares and increasing the frequency of service in related markets.

On March 22, 1994, Southwest announced that on May 26, 1994,
and June 6, 1994, it will expand service between BWI and Chicago.
Southwest also announced that on May 26, 1994, it will initiate its
low fare service between BWI and St. Louis, and on July 8, 1994,
between BWI and Birmingham, Alabama and Louisville, Kentucky. At
this time, USAir has not determined its response to the Southwest
announcement.

(section regarding Continental's now-long-defunct Continental Lite LFC)

USAir believes that Southwest, Continental or other low cost
carriers with a significant cost advantage over USAir likely will
expand their operations to additional markets. For example, in
December 1993, Southwest completed its acquisition of Morris Air,
a regional air carrier with operations concentrated in the western
U.S. This acquisition could enable Southwest to divert resources
to expand its operations in the eastern U.S. Furthermore, media
reports indicate that Southwest has entered into a long-term
agreement for the use of four additional gates at BWI, where it
currently operates from two gates. On March 4, 1994, Continental
further escalated prospective competition by announcing that it
will further reduce operations at its Denver, Colorado hub and
establish a flight crew base at Greensboro, North Carolina. These
measures are likely to increase losses at USAir because they could
enable Continental, which has significantly lower costs than USAir,
to expand further its high frequency, low fare service described
above in additional short-haul markets served by USAir with
substantial detriment to USAir. In addition, other low cost
carriers may enter other USAir markets. For example, America West
Airlines ("America West") announced on February 15, 1994 that it
will commence service on April 18, 1994 between Columbus, Ohio
where it operates a hub and Philadelphia, where USAir has a hub
operation. Other carriers, including some of the larger carriers,
have also indicated their intent to develop similar low-fare short-
haul service.

Later in the same document, under Management's Discussion and Analysis, the following observation is made:

The following general factors are among those that influence
USAir's financial results and its future prospects:

1. General economic conditions and industry capacity.
2. A decline in the proportion of passengers paying higher
yield "business fares" to passengers paying lower yield
fares.
3. The emergence and growth of low cost, low fare airlines
and USAir's high cost structure.
4. The trend toward globalization in the airline industry
and related regulatory limitations.

Does this sound familiar at all? The company has been in the exact same situation for ten years and has had no effective competitive response to WN. They were able to beat AirTran back in some markets, but WN's got the money to stay in a long fare/capacity war, with costs that are lower than AirTran's. I honestly think that the strategy of driving WN out by adding capacity and matching fares will not work; they (WN) will lose less money per flight and have deeper pockets anyway. They have shown that they will stick with a market for a very long time to make it work when they feel it is important strategically.