Welcome to Flightinfo.com

  • Register now and join the discussion
  • Friendliest aviation Ccmmunity on the web
  • Modern site for PC's, Phones, Tablets - no 3rd party apps required
  • Ask questions, help others, promote aviation
  • Share the passion for aviation
  • Invite everyone to Flightinfo.com and let's have fun

Virgin America continues some serious bleeding

Welcome to Flightinfo.com

  • Register now and join the discussion
  • Modern secure site, no 3rd party apps required
  • Invite your friends
  • Share the passion of aviation
  • Friendliest aviation community on the web

ualdriver

Well-known member
Joined
Dec 21, 2003
Posts
1,400
[SIZE=-1]WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Low-cost U.S. airline Virgin America narrowed its loss in the first quarter on sharply higher revenue and lower unit costs.[/SIZE]
[SIZE=-1] [/SIZE] [SIZE=-1]The airline, branded by Britain's Virgin Group , reported a $40.3 million (24.6 million pound) net loss compared with a $52 million net loss in the comparable period of 2008.[/SIZE]
[SIZE=-1] [/SIZE] [SIZE=-1]Excluding items, the airline reported a loss of $31.6 million.[/SIZE]
[SIZE=-1] [/SIZE] [SIZE=-1]Revenue per seat mile was 7.2 cents compared with 6.4 cents a year ago. Cost per available seat mile was 9.5 cents compared with 12.5 cents a year ago.[/SIZE]
[SIZE=-1] [/SIZE] [SIZE=-1]The company said revenue nearly doubled to $100 million from $52 million.[/SIZE]
[SIZE=-1] [/SIZE] [SIZE=-1]Launched in 2007, Virgin America is privately held but is required by the government to publicize its financial results.[/SIZE]
[SIZE=-1] [/SIZE] [SIZE=-1]The company said it had $63 million in total liquidity at the end of the first quarter.[/SIZE]
[SIZE=-1] [/SIZE] [SIZE=-1](Reporting by John Crawley; Editing by Steve Orlofsky)[/SIZE]


[SIZE=-1]Cush is making Tilton look good. And that's a 31.6M loss on 100M of revenue. I'd love to see more, but alas, being a private company and all makes that impossible. If they're burning through the cash their net losses suggest they are, maybe they have 2-3 quarters left, maybe less if their debtors have restrictions on minimum EBITDA or cash levels. Maybe they'll be able to find another investor with a couple hundred million to see them through another year.
[/SIZE]
 
I would like to take the opportunity to thank you for all the attention you give us. It is truly flattering.

If we were as insignificant as you would like us to believe I am sure you would have better things to do then waste your time posting jab after jab after jab at us. Thanks for the effort. It really shows that you care.

Have a great day my friend!
:beer:
 
I would like to take the opportunity to thank you for all the attention you give us. It is truly flattering.

If we were as insignificant as you would like us to believe I am sure you would have better things to do then waste your time posting jab after jab after jab at us. Thanks for the effort. It really shows that you care.

Have a great day my friend!
:beer:

Find a post where I said LCC's such as yours are insignificant. In fact, it's usually the Skybus, Virgin America, Allegiant guys themselves that make that implication in order to defend their subpar wages and/or their company's actions. I usually make arguments like, "airlines like Skybus, Virgin America, Allegiant, etc., hurt airlines like mine because your wages drag down mine," whilst I get responses to that argument like, "we're too small to affect your wages," "how can 100 pilots drag down the wages of 7000 pilots," etc., etc. I think airlines like Virgin America are far from insignificant, but unfortunately in a negative way for me, my peers, and my company.

Further, I believe airlines such as yours unnecessarily trash yields for EVERYONE everytime you guys enter a market. You use your discount airline pilot wages to subsidize your company's bottom line which helps Cush to undercut the prevailing fare between a particular city pair in order to steal market share. Everyone else then has to lower their fares (or a portion of their capacity) down to your ridiculously low levels and then the whole industry bleeds. Everytime a Skybus, a Virgin America, a Western Pacific, a insert new and improved LCC here, comes along, you take your pound of flesh from me and my peers and then go bankrupt. You ever wonder why the airline industry has such a hard time making a sustained, continuous profit? I don't wonder. My airline has the 1000 cuts to prove it.
 
So who do we blame? Do we blame the pilots that fly for these companies? Do we blame our government and unions for allowing these things to happen? Many pilots simply can't do anything else but fly planes, and if you're out of work many will take any job to try and provide security for themselves and there families.

And what do I do as a regional pilot? Making 75k flying a Turbo Prop do I go to Virgin America and lose money? Do I go to UAL, Delta, etc. and risk dangling on the bottom of a seniorty list?

Maybe instead of focusing on Virgin American you might wanna focus on the Fact that UAL has allowed RJ's to basically take over many of the Domestic routes that were once flown by UAL pilots. We have seen the arrival of CRJ700/900's, EMB170-190 pretty much start to dominate the domestic flying at many airlines. This outsource of flying as done more damage to Mainline pilots and people like me that wanna move up to the big leagues then someone like Alliegant, Skybus or Virgin America.

Like my buddy at UAL said, "Great Job, sh$tty Career".
 
Cash: The airline ended 1Q09 with $38 million in unrestricted cash and $63 million in total liquidity, with full funding for its operation through its projected profitability date.
How longer VA going to last (months/Years) with $38 Millions Unrestricted?
No Flames! just a question.
 
Maybe instead of focusing on Virgin American you might wanna focus on the Fact that UAL has allowed RJ's to basically take over many of the Domestic routes that were once flown by UAL pilots. We have seen the arrival of CRJ700/900's, EMB170-190 pretty much start to dominate the domestic flying at many airlines. This outsource of flying as done more damage to Mainline pilots and people like me that wanna move up to the big leagues then someone like Alliegant, Skybus or Virgin America.

Like my buddy at UAL said, "Great Job, sh$tty Career".

I agree with your buddy at UAL.

I don't' think my posts focus solely on VA? I think I spread the crappy wages/work rules thing around pretty well. I mean, I've had plenty of angry Virgin America, Allegiant, JetBlue, Valujet, etc., pilots respond to my posts. I think I've spread the love around quite well. This thread just happens to be about Virgin America, that's all.

Your point about RJ's is taken. Collectively, we at the mainline have let the RJ thing get out of hand. I don't agree with many of the reasons posted here as to why that happened, but regardless of the reason, we have to stop it now. I think outside of 1113, scope relief is over.

But it isn't RJ's killing fares out of the California Bay area. It wasn't RJ's dragging down yields up and down the east coast in the early 2000's or one of our hub cities like Denver. So I think comparing the problem that we ALL have with airlines like Virgin America is not the same as the problem we have with RJ's. The end result is the same- lost mainline jobs- but the problems are entirely different.
 
I flew on Virgin America once had a great experience flew from SFO to JFK, Clean Planes good service just wished they flew into JAX where I'm based so I could use them more. Hope they make it as they provide a better service than I ever had on UAL.
 
Last edited:
I flew on Virgin America once had a great experience flew from SFO to JFK, Clean Planes good service just wished they flew into JAX where I'm based so I could use them more. Hope they make it as they provide a better service than I ever had on UAL.

I have little doubt that you received better service on Virgin America than you would on United. They have shiny new airplanes, and happy, perky employees and I'm told a fantastic relationship with management. Their management loves their pilots, and they should! In fact, it wouldn't surprise me if the pilots went back during the turn to make sure the cabin was extra clean for your flight.

On the other hand, at our airline, every employee group on the UAL property is trying to avoid our management's desire to drag our wages, work rules, and retirement down to Virgin America's level. So you'll have to excuse us if we're not as happy to work for crap wages as the Virgin America employees obviously are. We're kind of in the middle of some ugliness right now.

Why did you delete what you wrote in the initial post? Did you get a PM from one of your VA buddies saying not to debate the topic with me or something? That's great that you get your financial information concerning United from USA Today. If you want to get into a deeper debate concerning UAL's financials compared to VA's, and use real sources besides multi-colored newspapers, I'll be happy to do that. I'll start the debate by saying UA's suck and generally provide some of the worst returns in the industry. However, they're not nearly as bad as the deep, structural problems that exist at VA.
 
I agree with your buddy at UAL.

I don't' think my posts focus solely on VA? I think I spread the crappy wages/work rules thing around pretty well. I mean, I've had plenty of angry Virgin America, Allegiant, JetBlue, Valujet, etc., pilots respond to my posts. I think I've spread the love around quite well. This thread just happens to be about Virgin America, that's all.

Your point about RJ's is taken. Collectively, we at the mainline have let the RJ thing get out of hand. I don't agree with many of the reasons posted here as to why that happened, but regardless of the reason, we have to stop it now. I think outside of 1113, scope relief is over.

But it isn't RJ's killing fares out of the California Bay area. It wasn't RJ's dragging down yields up and down the east coast in the early 2000's or one of our hub cities like Denver. So I think comparing the problem that we ALL have with airlines like Virgin America is not the same as the problem we have with RJ's. The end result is the same- lost mainline jobs- but the problems are entirely different.


With all due respect (and a serious question...), why is Southwest absent from your analysis? Do they not impact yields in the Bay area and Denver?

Fwiw, I don't UAL's domestic yield is nearly as big of a problem/issue as UAL's international yields. For that you can blame about everyone else except the LCC's. At least that is what many of the analysts state.

S
 

Latest resources

Back
Top