Looks Like I Picked the Wrong Day To Fly Through Chicago

I don't know the ins and outs of what happened to them, but I flew on Legend Airlines back in 2000 when they only operated for a short time. All leather seats, DirectTV at every seat and good food. I think AMR and the Wright amendment might have been their demise.

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legend_Airlines

Exactly.

From what I understand, very few people buy business or first class outright. Instead, they buy coach and use miles to upgrade. That's what I did when I traveled a lot for work because I wasn't allowed to buy business or first. I could only buy coach.

If I were king of the airline world, I'd start an airline with 737s that have four seats across and 20 rows instead of the six and 25. I'd make up for it by charging my passengers whatever premium is needed to make it work.

A back of the envelope calculation shows it'd cost like $400 more on a $500 flight. That may seem like a lot.

Dress shirts at Macy's are available for around $30. At Nordstrom, some of them are around $150.

Nordstrom is still in business.

I know this topic has come up on this very website before. I think the consensus was that there aren't enough passengers out there to support that kind of airline business model. The margins are quite thin, and the startup costs immense.

Legend had a lot of legal issues which contributed to its demise - they were the first ones I thought of when you mentioned the idea of a premium brand. I've got a good feeling that it's been tried in other places as well, although I don't have anything to support that. Maybe their model would work today? I dunno. If I knew how to run an airline I'd probably be trying to run an airline.

You have to be careful on the Nordstrom/Macy's comparison - I get what you're saying but Nordstrom ALSO carries $30 shirts. And Macy's ALSO carries $150 shirts. I think the issues of why one succeeds where the other one fails are more complicated than the idea of the premium brand - Macy's has been a household premium name for decades, too.
 
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