Ehh, I'm bored! Here goes:
SAN FRANCISCO -- Return for a moment to 1981 and the dawn of airline deregulation: People Express launches a no-frills service with $29 regional one-ways and $99 coast-to-coast fares cheap enough for almost anyone to fly.
And quickly went out of business. I know guys that worked there back in the day and you should hear the stories! Like heck I'm going to fly a full work schedule, have mandatory reserve AND go serve clerical functions in the office on my non-flying days for the privilege to offer America low fares.
Leap ahead to mid-2008: Travelers can still book coast-to-coast roundtrips for $198 -- which would be about $500 in 1981 dollars adjusted for inflation -- and add-on fees are now the industry norm. It's no wonder airlines are squeezed when we're paying 40 cents on the dollar nearly three decades later.
Add-on fees are probably more of the product of the average traveling joe clicking the absolute lowest price on Orbitz, independent of whether it's a non-stop flight or what airline they're flying.
Even consumer advocates acknowledge the anarchy that's resulted 30 years after the Civil Aeronautics Board stopped setting fares and routes. Deregulation has spawned a second-rate system offering little more than Greyhound buses with wings that make five or more often-late stops daily throughout the country to keep seats filled.
Nah, lots of non-stops coast-to-coast on legacies and LCC's to go around.
"In many ways we've seen the enemy and it is us," concedes David Stempler, president of the Air Travelers Association. "We're not willing to pay for better services yet we fully expect them."
Well, some do expect to get that "$5 footlong" and expect it to be hand-sliced chateaubriand, organic lettuce, stone-ground Dijon mustard and Hungarian Paprika-scented aioli...
"They can't raise fares because they have no pricing control," Stempler says. "It's not that they don't have the courage; it would be business suicide to fall out of lockstep."
There's pricing control. Just that everyone is holding their collective breath until the weak(er) pass out. Lots of brinkmanship going on these days in my uneducated humble opinion.
Instead, most airlines are nickeling, diming and fifty-dollaring buyers with fees hidden from search-engine sweeps to give the almighty consumers what they demand -- except it's now the illusion of the best-available bargain.
That's what the consumer wants! $49 with free mobile-to-mobile minutes, but fees out the ying yang because there's a cost involved with not reading the fine print.
As one blogger on travel-rants.com wrote: "What's next, charging me to go to the toilet?"
Don't go to a restaurant in Europe then!
In the height of audacity, several airlines are using the industry's weak on-time performance as a revenue enhancer by charging extra for seats in the first two rows of coach. Their target market: Travelers needing to catch a connecting flight who fear that they won't deplane quickly enough if they're seated in the back rows.
Now that's a reach... Bulkhead seating has always been a premium seat because of increased legroom and your loyal customers expect something a little above and beyond because of their loyalty to your airline. Or at least charging their credit card to 'miles' on your respective airlines card.
Yet U.S. consumers complain about the airline industry like we do Big Oil when it's our craving for the absolute lowest prices that's crippled the industry.
True.
Somewhere in the last 25 years, Americans came to believe cheap air travel is a right to which we're entitled just like we did cheap gas -- until that train left the station. With jet-fuel costs up 50% in the last year, we're awakening from a similar greed.
I agree.
Southwest planes reportedly make up to seven stops a day. Passengers on some flights from New Orleans to San Francisco, for instance, suffer through three stops and plane changes before reaching their destination -- meaning they've been in five airports in the course of their trip.
Can't "suffer" when you've either (a) went to southwest.com and presumed it was the lowest air fare and/or (b) clicked the 'purchase' button without actaully considering the number of legs or connect time. Read the fine print.
Competitors have been forced to move toward Southwest's model, leading to a steady disappearance of nonstop, long-haul flights throughout the United States. What we've gained in savings by patronizing the likes of Southwest we're losing in time and convenience.
Ehh, maybe I'm misreading Southernjet's flight schedules...
Meh, I've had enough. Breakfast time!