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republic, frontier and southwest airlines - Bullwinkle - 07-31-2009
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124900419561595825.html
Mornin.....
http://www.starbulletin.com/business/20090731_Republic_Air_increases_its_stake_in_Mokulele.html
Interesting battle shaping up, I have long suspected frontier or southwest would add hawaii to their routes as they have the equipment and west coast gates..... Could this realignment be driven by the fact that HNL will be a port of entry for the chinese carriers?
Virgin america has been expanding their west coast gates also, now have the gates allowing the hawaii "triangle" to take advantage of economical (fuel) routes .... we may see more service to the islands yet
RE: republic, frontier and southwest airlines - JerryCarr - 07-31-2009
Southwest in all probability has the resources to outbid Republic for Frontier. By taking over Frontier, Southwest would gain entry into Mexico and eliminate the only other low cost carrier in Denver and several other markets. Neither Southwest nor Frontier has ETOPS (transoceanic) certified aircraft, although some of Southwest's 737-700 planes could conceivably be reconfigured for such. Southwest's only foray into Hawaii was by codesharing on now defunct ATA. I have a friend who is in revenue management at Delta, and he has frequently said that Hawaii routes (being heavy on discounted leisure passengers and low on full-fare business types) are not profit centers, at least for the legacy carriers. With its lower cost structure, Southwest might be different, but they are all about making money. If they can't make a decent profit, they won't do it.
Virgin America, with its brand recognition, is another story. They could be a wild card in the Hawaii market, but will probably wait for the economy to improve.
Cheers,
Jerry
RE: republic, frontier and southwest airlines - macuu222 - 07-31-2009
Speaking of competitive west coast hawaii routes....has anyone tried the new Alaska Airlines Kona to Seattle route lately? Their walk up one way fare is $199.00 if it's not sold out. Also Hawaiian is having a bargain price to Vegas from Honolulu of $185.00 one way when it's available.
Seems like bargain summer airfares are still around.
RE: republic, frontier and southwest airlines - Bob Orts - 07-31-2009
quote:i don't think SWA will fly direct from the mainland to Hawaii. Their current fleet (and that of Republic and Frontier) do not have aircraft that is certfied for that type of travel. That would (as one aviation expert said) would move SWA out of its traditional model into an area they have no experience. Everything about SWA was based on a model that worked (point to point, same aircarft, etc) and Hawaii would require a radical change. I see code sharing as their option, but not direct flights.
Originally posted by Bullwinkle
Interesting battle shaping up, I have long suspected frontier or southwest would add hawaii to their routes as they have the equipment and west coast gates..... Could this realignment be driven by the fact that HNL will be a port of entry for the chinese carriers?
RE: republic, frontier and southwest airlines - Laughing_girl - 07-31-2009
SWA, at the start, pioneered a new model of running an airline and made it profitable at that. Although Herb Kelleher is no longer a day to day fixture there, hopefully some of his methodology for running an airline will stay.
Although Hawaii is out of their comfort zone at the moment, I would not be surprised to look to SWA to shake up the typical formulas here if they enter this market - (not as a code share).
In 2006, SWA purchased it's first 737-700 and was scheduled for del of 44 more - "The aircraft has recently received federal approval for 180-minute ETOPS (extended range twin-engine operations) flights -- meaning that it can travel over oceans, as long as it's within three hours flight time of an airport, which it will be in this case." (from http://www.bizjournals.com/wichita/stories/2000/01/17/story7.html)
There are also white tails that Aloha had that are already available.
RE: republic, frontier and southwest airlines - JerryCarr - 07-31-2009
Southwest has broken out of its original operational formula and comfort zone by beginning service to congested urban airports such as Boston and New York Laguardia. The Frontier acquisition, if approved, would allow further movement in this direction. (Atlanta and other large Southeastern cities such as Charlotte are a void in Southwest's current network.)
I still don't think Hawaii is on their radar, though, except as a codeshare which would allow them to sell tickets and their customers to redeem frequent flyer awards on another airline. If used for ETOPS, those 737-700 aircraft would require special configuration and extra maintenance that goes considerably outside Southwest's cookie cutter "all one aircraft" model of operations. Of course, who thought they would ever fly into Laguardia? I could be wrong. I've been wrong before.
Cheers,
Jerry
RE: republic, frontier and southwest airlines - Laughing_girl - 07-31-2009
Jerry - I love it! Aviation talk! [
] More interesting to me than if or if not pot will be legalized! [] just kidding no one take that seriously!!I got the Boeing expert coaching me on this side! (And he sneers about the old L-1011's because they are from lockheed or god forbid an airbus! [}
])RE: republic, frontier and southwest airlines - Bullwinkle - 07-31-2009
Love airplane talk
my scarebus story is a continental A300 yaw dampner that went south, never again
One of my few good ATA flights , I think they may have been under contract to pleasant hawaiian back then. An ancient L1011, This old bird was one one of its last LAX - OGG runs, faster than most flights today however. Remember the the orange ice cream 1/2 hr out?
edited after some fact checking - grin
RE: republic, frontier and southwest airlines - mdd7000 - 07-31-2009
The L1011 - what a nice bird! Rolls Royce power.
RE: republic, frontier and southwest airlines - HiloHaole - 08-01-2009
Most major airlines keep Hawaii routes as an enticement for business flyers to fly their airlines on other routes. These business flyers will build up frequent flyer mileage to use for Hawaii.
The L-1011 had the smoothest landings, ever!! The flight attendents didn't like pushing the carts in an L-1011 because the floor slanted.