Another bid to buy Midwest Airlines?

[Lear70]

yeah Transcon is where the money is=NOT Airtran posted a loss because of the bonuses to upper magmt. Airtran CEO needs to look at JB's CEO pay!!!!

Ummm... OK. Sure, what you said.

JL's pay would make such a HUGE difference in our profitability (or BF, or...).

$1 Million to one or two people isn't going to make that big of a difference. That represents probably about 1 tenth of a penny per passenger we fly.

Keep trying though, eventually you'll hit on something that actually WILL affect our RASM (hint: that's an operational cost / load factor / pricing issue and we have just about the lowest non-fuel CASM in the ENTIRE INDUSTRY. Not opinion, that's fact).

 

[Eagle757shark]

Lear70,
I think we would all prefer AirTran find a Midwest city and open up a hub. But that is not possible given that every major city has an airline running a hub from it, and to try to move in on a carrier would be financial suicide for AirTran. The reality is acquiring another carrier is the lesser of two evils. I definitely prefer being the acquirer versus being acquired for obvious reasons. What do Southwest, American, Northwest, US Airways, Delta and Continental all have in common? They have all acquired two airlines in their history to build their current route networks. AirTran can only do so much expanding on the east coast with point to point before they start competing with themselves. That is evident and I believe management understands that now. Sometimes you have to pay to play and that is what may have to happen for AirTran to go where it is trying to go! I imagine more money will be thrown Midwest way real soon. We shall see.....very interesting year ahead.

 

[Lear70]

You're probably right about more money being thrown out there.

I actually wouldn't mind being acquired by SWA, as getting stuck as an F/O at SWA isn't a bad financial proposition, but I doubt any such thing will happen as our 717's don't fit SWA's model and they aren't worth much unless Midwest were to buy them at the same price we bought them (unlikely if this acquisition doesn't go through, as Midwest's stock price and lending ability will likely suffer dramatically).

Not to mention, would they take all our pilots eliminating half our fleet? Doubt it.

It is what it is; we can only hope it's not too big a hit from the integration. I would much rather have merged with Frontier - at least they're growing and hiring and their market hub makes a lot more sense for a West Coast operation.

 

[captainj]

I say we take the 290mil and the 737 next year and just start our own hub in mke.

 

[Lear70]

The $290 Million is primarily in stock, not cash.

Lots of better places to go head-to-head with someone, such as Phoenix, Tucson, Las Vegas, Houston...

If you're going to invade someone's hub, might as well do it in a helpful place for Mid-west to West Coast ops.

 

[AFcitrus]

For what it's worth...

I flew three flights into and out of MKE last week and they were all packed full of Midwest lovin' Airtran hatin' passengers. For a city that doesn't want Airtran around, they certainly are giving us a lot of business.

As a side note I talked with a Midwest employee at the airport about the pending buyout/merger and asked her thoughts. She told me that she was looking forward to the deal because a few years ago she didn't think she would still be employed now and that Airtran coming in gave her confidence in her future.

No flamebait, just repeating what I was told and witnessed. There is a lot of bad press in MKE about Airtran but quite frankly I think it is all being engineered by the "outspoken minority".

 

[Steeler Fan]

As a side note I talked with a Midwest employee at the airport about the pending buyout/merger and asked her thoughts. She told me that she was looking forward to the deal because a few years ago she didn't think she would still be employed now and that Airtran coming in gave her confidence in her future.

I heard similar from a friend of mine who's an F/O for Midwest. Is that the general consensus from Midwest's employee group?

 

[pilotmyf]

For what it's worth...

I flew three flights into and out of MKE last week and they were all packed full of Midwest lovin' Airtran hatin' passengers. For a city that doesn't want Airtran around, they certainly are giving us a lot of business.

.

can't beat $16.89 ATL-MKE!!!!

 

[EX_CV580FR8Dawg]

I still think I have some Wendy's cups around..can i get a ticket?

 

[crashpad]

Brett Favre retires the same year Miswest becomes Air Tran...I doubt Wisconsinites will be able to deal with it mentally.