More Cost Cutting From NWA

Malko

Malko

Why…..? It’s so tiring. 🤙
Staff member
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Northwest Airlines pulls pretzels from flights; trail mix to cost $1
Associated Press
May 27, 2005 PRETZEL0528
Northwest Airlines passengers who said goodbye to free meals in February at least got free pretzels to console them. Now Northwest is taking the pretzels away, too.

Beginning June 9, coach passengers who want anything other than soda will have to pay for it. They can get a 3-ounce bag of trail mix for $1. Northwest Airlines Corp. spokesman Kurt Ebenhoch said the airline has no immediate plans to stop offering soda for free.

He said pulling the free pretzels should save $2 million a year. Northwest, the nation's fourth-largest airline, lost $458 million in the last quarter alone.


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Consultant Says "Don't Be Stupid"

"Please remember you are in a service industry," [Adam Pilarski of Avitas] said, and try to avoid what former Continental CEO Gordon Bethune referred to as "sky nazi" cabin service. He criticized "nickel-and-dime" attitudes toward cutting amenities, scoffing at airlines' publicized moves to remove olives and pillows. You must cut costs in ways that make sense, related to productivity." Cost control "has to fit the business model, and must be related to productivity."

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Re: More Cost Cutting Form NWA

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He said pulling the free pretzels should save $2 million a year. Northwest, the nation's fourth-largest airline, lost $458 million in the last quarter alone.


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So they lost $458 million in a quarter, pretzels cost $2 million a year, $500,000 a quarter. Wow, if they would have done that earlier in the year the loss would have only been $457.5 million. This cut seems kind of rediculous, the solution is going to have to be much bigger than bags of pretzels.
 
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As Pilarski said:

Don't be stupid

Yuppers. Seems to be something people need to be told, cause this is, well, stupid!
 
Re: More Cost Cutting Form NWA

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"Please remember you are in a service industry," [Adam Pilarski of Avitas] said, and try to avoid what former Continental CEO Gordon Bethune referred to as "sky nazi" cabin service. He criticized "nickel-and-dime" attitudes toward cutting amenities, scoffing at airlines' publicized moves to remove olives and pillows. You must cut costs in ways that make sense, related to productivity." Cost control "has to fit the business model, and must be related to productivity."

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Seriously, dude. That's the exact point. Right now, it's like "what else can we take away or charge the passengers for?" Here's and idea: RAISE THE TICKET PRICES TO COVER THE DAMN PRETZELS! Odds are passengers are gonna complain more about losing their pretzels than paying an extra $1 a ticket. If the pretzels cost more than $1 a person, then they need to start shopping at Sam's instead of buying from their current supplier......
 
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Those spinzels are really good too! I once found of bag of them at Target. I wish i could find them again.
 
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Paying for anything but pop, eh...what a sad state of affairs. Hmmm, makes me want to travel back in time to the 1960s and take a PanAm flight. I'll bet there was some good sevice back then, plus I'm assuming the pretzels were complimentary.
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When will they learn that they can't charge Hilton prices and give Motel 6 service?

Is it any wonder Jetblue and Airtran are riding high when they charge less and give better service?
 
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The thing is, when they start charging people are less willing to purchase them. I never see anybody actually buy those snack pack meal things on USAirways, maybe one or two a flight. Work the cost of 5-10 dollars into the ticket instead of the 5-10dollars PER FLIGHT.
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Raise ticket prices? Sacre bleu!

Standby for some management apologists preaching about paradigm shifts, "new realities" and hub-and-spoke "legacies".
 
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I am afraid you have it all wrong my friend. The airlines are charging "motel 6" prices not "Hilton" prices. The airlines are loosing money hand over fist by not charging enough. I just checked the price of a Ticket on Travelocity. I can get a round trip tcket from MCO to LAX on U.S Airways for $269, or a nonstop flight on Delta for $279. 4400 miles round trip for less than $300 is a steal. I did a little work for you to put things into perspective.
If you were to fly Delta you would be in LA from Orlando in about 5 hours. It would be a little faster on the way back.
Driving breaks down as such.
78 hours round trip if you don't stop.
Fuel costs averaging 35mpg @$2.10 per gallon $300 total.
Hotel costs for the 4 days it will take you round trip @$70 per night $280
Food for 4 days on the road per person. About $80
Total $660 and 4 days on the road, and a serious case of monkey butt from all that driving. I think I will pay the "Hilton " price at Delta thank you.
 
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Here's some good family fun:

Check out two city pairs, say San Francisco to Detroit, on Orbitz or Travelocity. Then hop on Greyhound's website and price the same trip.
 
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I guess with the $380 i'd save flying in the example above I could probably afford to go to Sam's and buy one of those industrial sized bag of pretzels.
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Raise ticket prices? Sacre bleu!

Standby for some management apologists preaching about paradigm shifts, "new realities" and hub-and-spoke "legacies".

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They have started to raise those prices -- by a whopping $5 to $10. Let's see, you're billions of dollars in the hole, you've got record demand to the point that they're talking about LONG delays this summer, and all you want to shoot for is $5 to $10?

Hell, man, the system can't handle demand. So reduce it, by raising prices to a level that you can make money on.

And the empty suits keep on talking about high legacy carrier salaries. Well, the pilots at SWA top out higher than 737 captains do at many legacy carriers do. Hmmm, someone seems to be making money.

Here's a relevant discussion. BTW, the professor on the show made a comment about all those planes parked in the desert. Sorry, professor. Those planes ain't never gonna fly again, unless someone down in Africa or Latin America decides to fly 'em.

KQED's Forum: State of the Airline Industry
 
(I'm actually heavily in favor of raising ticket prices!)

Hell, some of the people sitting at our table were bitching about ticket prices during one of our dinners but felt more than comfortable plunking down almost $400 a head to take a 20 minute floatplane ride to pet some puppies and take a 1/2 mile dog sled ride! Meanwhile a 4 hour flight from MSP to YVR was "preposterous" at a $200 fare.
 
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Hell, some of the people sitting at our table were bitching about ticket prices during one of our dinners but felt more than comfortable plunking down almost $400 a head to take a 20 minute floatplane ride to pet some puppies and take a 1/2 mile dog sled ride! Meanwhile a 4 hour flight from MSP to YVR was "preposterous" at a $200 fare.

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Kind of like the guy who will pay $75-100 for a golf instructor, on top of $100 for greens fees and another $50 for a cart, but then bitches about paying a CFI $35 an hour.

It's funny how people work. They'll pay thousands of dollars for things that are trivial -- ever been at a party where someone has to tell you how much their appliances cost? -- but then they'll bitch about having to pay $500 to get on a $100 million airplane that takes them from Washington to LA in five hours.

BTW, at that party? Someone decided that he had enough of the people bragging about their kitchen so he decided to spill some of the $100 a bottle wine -- which wasn't that good -- all over the $3000 granite counter -- which looked ugly -- and left.
 
Beautiful!

Besides, that $100 bottle of domestic wine isn't a whole lot better than the 4,20 EUR pitchet from the cask at a corner-side French cafe.
 
Hell yeah they need to raise prices. There are all kind of freaks that can afford to fly now. Ever watch airline? They need to raise prices on order to weed some of them out. Some of you might be thinking that there are some rich wierdos out there too. However you need to keep in mind that rich people are never crazy or wierd; they are eccentric.
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