Why is SKYBUS?

[bgaviator]

Cutting West coast cities, fuel at record highs,
loosing 3-5m a month? This was the formula that put Indy out of business (among other things)!!
Anybody know how much start-up capital Skybus had.

From what I've heard from former employees, Indy Air was also running their innaugural flights with only like 2-3 people on board the planes.

 

[bgaviator]

156 seats? So does that extra 6 seats require one extra flight attendant? You would think that would not be worth it.

yes, that aircraft has to have 4 FA's....but even if it only had 150 seats it would require 4 FA's.

 

[JJET44]

From what I've heard from former employees, Indy Air was also running their innaugural flights with only like 2-3 people on board the planes.

No, I did a few flights on the first day. It was more like 15-20 on the RJ. I think my first flight was a deadhead to BNA to do the return trip to IAD. I had to laugh when a passenger stated how she liked our brand-new 5-year-old RJ.

 

[bgaviator]

yeah, I wish people would stop comparing SX to Inday...different concept, different operating costs.

 

[Blueline]

yes, that aircraft has to have 4 FA's....but even if it only had 150 seats it would require 4 FA's.

Not true. JB removed 6 seats & 1 FA.

 

[bgaviator]

yes, you are right Blueline, my bad. For some reason I thought once you hit 150 you had to have four. Only once it's past that 50 seat mark you have to take on an extra FA.

 

[ttuite]

yes, you are right Blueline, my bad. For some reason I thought once you hit 150 you had to have four. Only once it's past that 50 seat mark you have to take on an extra FA.

I flew on Easy Jet over in Europe. They have the same configuration. They told me that they liked having the 4th flight attendant because they can sell more product that way. The increase in sales more than offsets the additional pay. They also have 2 additional hands to help during the turns. Perhaps the same logic applies to Skybus.

 

[bgaviator]

oh I'm sure the same logic applies, absolutely...especially if they get to charge their top fares for those extra six seats it more than makes up for paying the extra FA.

 

[JJET44]

yeah, I wish people would stop comparing SX to Inday...different concept, different operating costs.

Same moves as Indy's last 8 months of existance.
If you want people to stop comparing the two then maybe they should stop taking plays out of Indy's End-of-Op's playbook.

 

[bgaviator]

Same moves as Indy's last 8 months of existance.
If you want people to stop comparing the two then maybe they should stop taking plays out of Indy's End-of-Op's playbook.

I am not that familiar with Indy Air's full history. Can you explain your statement a little further? All I know is I was working at Dayton Internation one day and saw an Indy Air RJ land and I had no idea who they even were...I had heard no news or press about it...but it seems almost as soon as they were in Dayton, they were gone.

 

[temcgrew]

I flew on Easy Jet over in Europe. They have the same configuration. They told me that they liked having the 4th flight attendant because they can sell more product that way. The increase in sales more than offsets the additional pay. They also have 2 additional hands to help during the turns. Perhaps the same logic applies to Skybus.

Pay wise it's only like having 2 F/A's onboard anyway.

 

[JJET44]

Indy was a LCC that morphed from ACA. ACA was a regional for United and Delta. During United's bankruptcy they through away ACA's contract and made them rebid. ACA would not accept United's terms and went off on their own. They used a combination of 86 CRJ's and about 10 A319's as Independence Air. They used the Airbuses for Florida and the west coast. Only after about six months of operations they started to cut west coast cities stating that they could make more money and save cost on fuel utilizing the A319's for routes on the east coast. Indy went out of business in Jan. of 06.

I compared the two in the fact that they both cut west coast cities to save money. The fact that a company starts changing their business so early in the game tells me that they are starting to conserve cash to keep in business. Not a good sign!!!

 

[IADBLRJ41]

yeah, I wish people would stop comparing SX to Inday...different concept, different operating costs.

Very different.. Indy pilots did not lower the bar. SX has lowered the bar and then some.. I hope the place goes away quick. What a waste of a jetfuel.

 

[JPAustin]

Comparing Indy to Skybus is apples to oranges. CASM is cheaper in a A319 than a CRJ, so Indy still had 86 lose-money CRJs to contend with. Also, all things equal, there is an optimum range for each aircraft, and frankly, coast to coast in an A319 might push the optimum range (as far as CASM is concerned) down when fuel prices are high. When Indy ended their coast-coast service, fuel costs were much lower (especially if they hedged), so there was more than meets the eye in that situation.

Not to mention there are many different nuances to each model (Indy and Sky) that make it unrealistic to make a wash comparison between the two.

 

[ualdriver]

Also, all things equal, there is an optimum range for each aircraft, and frankly, coast to coast in an A319 might push the optimum range (as far as CASM is concerned) down when fuel prices are high. When Indy ended their coast-coast service, fuel costs were much lower (especially if they hedged), so there was more than meets the eye in that situation.

Actually, all other costs being equal, average CASM is driven down the greater the average distance the aircraft flies. CASM = total costs/available seat-miles. If you put more seat-miles in the denominator, costs being equal, average CASM gets driven down.

What probably happened is one of a few things, and I suspect it had NOTHING to do with fuel costs as, on average, you're paying high average fuel costs no matter where you go. Further average fuel costs per ASM go down the longer that you fly. That fuel cost thing was just a lame "sound bite" for the media to explain away a failure of the airline to make money (or enough money) on those routes.

One of probably a couple or few things happened. One, demand on those markets was just plain low and it was unprofitable. Two, demand was high, but they weren't netting much money, per passenger, for that long distance flight make sense.

For example, let's say Skybus managment figures out that flying CMH-BUR that they can make $10 net, per passenger flying that route. They also figure out that they can make $10 net, per passenger, flying CMH-NH (wherever they fly in New Hampshire, I forget.) Well, if you're going to make $10 bucks per passenger on a flight, you're much better off flying that aircraft a shorter distance and doing that flight several times per day than you are doing that longer flight once a day to make the same money per passenger. In other words, if you're going to make the same total profit flying a plane a shorter distance as you do a longer distance, you're better off flying multiple shorter legs than fewer longer legs per day.

That's why I suspect they dropped those long distance flights.