AirTran Airways Reports All-Time Record May Traffic

[Max Powers]

Well of course they did. They are consistantly $200- $300 cheaper than all other airlines, including Southwest. Matter of fact I bought my mother in law a ticket on them round trip from Jax to Rdu for $240 including ALL taxes and fees!!!!! The next cheapest fare was Southwest at $370!! That is a significant difference. This is not the way to make money in my opinion.

False you need to look at the data.....Our RASM is just slightly higher than SWA. In other words our tickets in the aggregate are more.

 

[Beantown]

I have to say I saw the same thing when looking to get the wife and kids from CLT-ROC. 2 months in adv. and got 4 RT tickets for $132 each. Everyone else including my airline were $350ish. What really got me was when I picked my seats (yes you can add $50 total for seats) the plane was booked to almost 70%. Not sure if they were just blocking some seats or if they actually sold that many. Either way i'm not sure why they were undercutting everyone by 100%. Seems to me they have ZERO chance on making any money off my family and could have easly made an extra $400 off me.

Not trying to pick on Airtran as you see this with all the airlines. I'm not sure with computers and huge staffs doing nothing but REV. Mgmt how this happens so often but it does. -bean

 

[outtahere]

Hey just wanted say thanks for helping us out with record increase in traffic. Now go have a little STFU

Thanks d!ckhead, perhaps in the future I will go with Southwest. And no, I have never applied at Airtran, I can't afford the paycut, and seeing how upgrade is going to be soaring over there, it would take far to many years to recoup my losses. Now for pinnacle, you paid for training correct? For you to call me out as if flying an RJ somehow makes me stupid, I just have to remind you that you PAID FOR YOUR JOB!!!!!! So perhaps you should take your own advise and take it down a notch. Now, except for the attack dogs on here, I like Airtran, and I want to see them survive, you can't do that if you don't charge enough to make a profit. I know Airtran wants to steal market share from Delta, but how long can you survive at cut rate prices. Oh and pinacle, I would love for you to show me where Airtran is more expensive than Delta. It would make me happy to be able to support the bottom line of my code share airline.

 

[Lear70]

Either way i'm not sure why they were undercutting everyone by 100%. Seems to me they have ZERO chance on making any money off my family and could have easly made an extra $400 off me.

Ummm... undercutting everyone by 100%?

Wouldn't that make the ticket free?

From $350 to $142 (what you paid per ticket total), is about a 60% reduction.

Sorry, the whole exaggerating thing drives me a little crazy. Supportable facts, even if it doesn't seem the point gets across, it's actually better.

We're not competing for market share from Delta, we already have it with record load factors.

Expecting a 2nd quarter profit, albeit modest, amongst the highest fuel prices ever recorded in the history of aviation. While I'd like to see prices come up more so we could more easily afford fair wages for our employees, we're arguably doing better than most of our competitors.

So while I won't tell you go have a cup of STFU (even though it was kind of funny at the time), I'll simply advise you to "attend to your own house".

At this rate, we're looking at downsizing from 25-30% or more at almost ALL the regionals. Should keep everyone (unfortunately) otherwise occupied.

 

[mnboyev]

Hmmm ... ck it !

www.kayak.com

this site almost always shows Tranny is not the cheapest .. at least in tix pricing !... grin..... But I do agree some of the web specials are too low..

 

[metroplex]

lear 70, did you try to go to XO jet, AAI not good enough?

 

[Lear70]

lear 70, did you try to go to XO jet, AAI not good enough?

Heh heh... let's just say that AAI management is furious that I helped kill a T.A. that was going to crucify the junior pilots and retirees while netting management Millions in savings through loss of work rules and Scope concessions.

XO Jet would be a fantastic career position, but AirTran is a good job as well. Both have their pros and cons, like every other job. Why the interest?

 

[Helos2Galaxy]

ORLANDO, Fla., June 3 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- AirTran Airways, a subsidiary of AirTran Holdings, Inc., (NYSE: AAI - News), today reported record traffic for the month of May 2008. The airline reported that revenue passenger miles (RPMs), available seat miles (ASMs), enplaned passengers, and load factor represent new all-time company records for the month of May.
For May, traffic grew by 18.2 percent to more than 1.7 billion RPMs based on a 14.0 percent increase in capacity. The company's load factor for the month was 79.3 percent. The airline enplaned more than 2.2 million passengers for the month, a 6.0 percent increase from May 2007.


Well at least that is some good news. Hopefully the 2nd qtr is profitable as Wall Street expects.

BFD --- It's all irrelevant if you can't make money doing it..

 

[RIDETHELIGHTING]

So while I won't tell you go have a cup of STFU (even though it was kind of funny at the time), I'll simply advise you to "attend to your own house".

.

Yea I thought it was too, but guess not. :beer:

 

[Benhuntn]

You must be a junior fo at AirTran?

 

[Benhuntn]

Yes, I'm sure our management is interested in us passing along the theories of some RJ pilot on a message board.

You don't look to be much past the rj stage, Buck Rogers.

 

[maxblast72]

BFD --- It's all irrelevant if you can't make money doing it..

It is good news that load factors are still increasing even with all the ticket price increases going through. If the load factors start decreasing significantly with these higher prices, that is a sign that we have found the consumer's breaking point. That would be bad news.

So far the consumer isn't balking at the higher prices. That is good news for the future as we try to catch ticket prices up to the quickly escalating price of fuel. Remember alot of our tickets were purchased long before this fuel spike hit.

 

[PCL_128]

You don't look to be much past the rj stage, Buck Rogers.

I'm not the one trying to "school" management on yield management theories.

 

[Colonel Savage]

You don't look to be much past the rj stage, Buck Rogers.

Interresting comment from a pilot who says he flys "light twins for SWA"...

 

[Adiabatic Pilot]

Interresting comment from a pilot who says he flys "light twins for SWA"...

Don't worry, BenHuntn has been flying some pretty big jets for a long, long time...and his humor must have zinged right over your head.

 

[~~~^~~~]

I've done the research many times. You're simply incorrect. In many cases, our fares are higher than Delta. Usually the fares are identical. It's extremely rare that our fare is below DAL's.

They are identical because Delta has had to lower fares to match AirTran on routes where Delta previously had no competition. Years ago, when AirTran began LA service with the Airbus, it had a net result of Delta's operating profit on the MD11 going from ~$200,000 per flight down to break-even.

I'm not saying it was unfair, or wrong. It was the low fare business model and competition. Delta throws RJ's at 717 at a loss as a competitive response rather than withdraw. It is a tough business.

Delta is more efficient now and says it can compete with AirTran head to head. Delta has an advantage in their larger route structure that can get more revenue from flights from anywhere to anywhere.

AirTran does, at times, beat Delta on service. Delta can not tolerate this from its' employees and contractors. 1 Billion dollar seat and inflight entertainment packages do not impress if pax are greeted by a rude agent, of the Panasonic IFE rarely works. RJ's are not service competitive with 717's.

My folks (on the side job) and wife can most often find cheaper fares at AirTran and buy them instead of Delta. Delta's cheap fares usually sell out faster. They like AirTran's service on short flights. On longer flights they very much prefer Delta's amenities.

Unlike Beantown, I had to say no to my folks, or wife buying tickets on AirTran. Not that I've got anything against you guys, but we're a Delta family. It just kills me when the same pilots that bitch about low fare airlines buy tickets because they saved money by not flying their own brand - duh.

AirTran is going to have to keep raising fares. There is no such thing as a low cost airline any more. It is all expensive. How that will effect "AirTran - Go there's nothing stopping you" cheap mantra, who knows? But there is no doubt AirTran runs a good airline.

 

[Ty Webb]

They are identical because Delta has had to lower fares to match AirTran on routes where Delta previously had no competition..

Thanks for a well-written post . . . I would agree with much of what you wrote in your post, but the situation between Delta and Airtran is kind of a "chicken or the egg" question.

In my observation, AirTran lowers the fares in a market when they enter it, it is obvious, however, Delta's response is to "dump seats" into that market, to try to "keep market share". That prevents AirTran from raising the price.

The example I like to use is Pensacola, FL. Before AirTran, Delta had 4 or 5 flights a day from PNS to ATL, using DC9 and RJ's. Since AirTran entered the market Delta now has 8 flights a day, mostly MD88, and even including a B757! AirTran operates 5 B717 a day.

Obviously, there was much more traffic to ATL at the lower rate structure, but where is the "happy medium", and how do you get there in this dysfunctional relationship, with one lowering the market price, and the other responding by dumping capacity into that market? Should they go on "Springer" together and throw folding chairs at each other? :laugh:

What's the solution? I don't know. I would be in favor of regulation saying that "no airline can offer a fare on a route that is less than its cost to operate that route" or something to that effect.

TW

 

[Networ-King]

Should they go on "Springer" together and throw folding chairs at each other? :laugh:

TW

That wasn't springer.... that was Heraldo Rivera .

Net

 

[gearup5]

Now if we could only get Captains to quit picking up FO open time.....

 

[Colonel Savage]

Now if we could only get Captains to quit picking up FO open time.....

They can do that? Please tell me you're kidding.