BSpeaker

Since you asked... Flying out of PHX is occasionally dicey time-wise but not always. I've arrived and the TSA wait line is out in the walkways. I like to take my time and grab a sandwich for the long haul since I've had too much airplane food in my life and I like to find healthier options.

I'm a speaker so my business travel includes things that often require checking at least a box or a bag. If I want to ship ahead, I can, but I've had shipments lost for important conferences even when I shipped with all the requisite tracking mechanisms. And it's a wash on the cost to ship vs the cost to check a bag.

And finally, some of my business travel includes more than one business meeting or speaking gig. So I'm not flying into the airport, going to a meeting and checking in to a hotel for one night. I might fly into city A, do a conference; drive to city B and do one their the next day; then meet with clients at another location in city B. So I need a car. It also allows me to keep some of my things in the car rather than hauling them back and forth to the car or shuttle/taxi for each meeting.

For me - as I said - If the flight and travel time will be 4-5 hours, it makes moire sense to drive.

Dieuwer

JetBlue seems to slowly built international relationships, with JAL and EK for instance. Only a matter of time to see B6 offer reciprocal benefits on many more foreign carriers.

CMK10

Those of us who live in RDU beg to differ.

BearX220

Seriously. WN is no low-price leader any more. I cross-shop WN occasionally and it is very rare to discover a compelling price advantage versus AA/DL/UA. The US arm of AA tends to lead on price, I find, with DL sometimes in the hunt too.

I don't think presence or absence of F really makes much difference, but I do say it's been years since WN qualified as an "alternative carrier." WN serves 89 destinations, carries more pax domestically than any other airlines, and runs the world's biggest fleet of 737s. That, plus their vanished price / value edge, makes them indubitably mainstream.

JetBlue is a trunk / mainstream presence in the Northeast but has very limited impact elsewhere. VX remains a fringe curiosity with no real market impact -- just a sort of cult fan base -- after seven years of (until recently unprofitable) operations.

darthbimmer

You mean that the demand leisure travel is highly elastic. As prices rise and/or value deteriorates, demand decreases. Would-be travelers either substitute goods (they drive instead of fly, as discussed elsewhere in this thread) or they purchase fewer trips.

This is certainly true for me as a leisure traveler. My family and I look at today's high prices and opt out of taking trips we would have taken at the prevailing prices of 2 years ago.

This is true for business travel, too, but business is less demand elastic.

Dieuwer

Probably depends on which income bracket you belong to.
If I want to take a trip, I usually start tracking airfare for my preferred itinerary a minimum 6 months out. If the airfare reaches the "best possible price" for that particular itinerary, I buy the airfare.
Sure, I would love to travel on <5 cpm to Las Vegas or Europe but that ain't gonna happen. My spend generally is around 10 cpm.

Ancien Maestro

If I had to pay retail high prices, I wouldn't take the trips.

I guess our experience with airline tickets are low season, as we purchased cheap airfare tickets prior to getting into the miles game. We are somewhat flexible around the holidays, and seem to luck out on the bargain point redemptions. Otherwise, we would take more vehicle trips. We don't take out of province vehicle trips anymore, but I could see vehicle trips as a legitimate substitute, if the hotel loyalty programs we are involved in have sufficient coverage.

Cloudship

There is more to travel though than vacations. Sometimes it is visiting relatives, or spending the holiday with family out of state. For that matter there is also travel to attend an event or for personal enrichment/education. And in the long run, it also makes a difference for a young adult in their decision about how far away to move from their home.

So in fact air travel actually has impacts outside of just the travel itself. This is something I don't think is or was adequately understood when this merger was allowed.

pinniped

Even with no checked bags, there aren't many airports where I'm willing to risk showing up less than an hour or so before departure. Even at MCI, with a mobile BP, short security queues, and a short walk from car to gate, I still arrive an hour early. That puts even the shortest of short-hauls (MSP, Chicago or Dallas, really) at around 4 hours door-to-door to most parts of those cities.

As for local transit, I wish more airports had it. I love this option where possible - DCA, ORD, MDW, etc. - although usually for the convenience of not having to park the rental car downtown, no so much *beating* the rental car to my hotel. Although that can happen as well...kind of fun riding the CTA into Chicago at rush hour, passing all of the cars...

If you fly AA or DL, can you earn tier miles on AS? (I forget how this relationship works.) If so, that makes AS's effective route map pretty strong, if you can live without having the "native" elite benefits.

Yes. I find them to be the high-fare, full-service airline. I'm willing to pay a premium to fly them where they deliver extra value...such as if I really need to check two bags or I'm flying somewhere where they have the premium airport (Dallas, Chicago, etc.).

I guess that gets back to the AA/DL question for AS. How is an AS elite treated when flying those airlines? Just like any other nonelite?

BearX220

In the leisure market there is gotta-go travel (kids to college, funerals, etc.) and discretionary travel (vacations, getaways, etc.). Despite what some may think the latter represents indispensable income for all tiers of airlines, and the rolling cascade of policies that discourage discretionary travel -- higher prices, fewer frequencies, poor reliability and delays, security hassle, diluted FF programs for non-elites, etc. -- is counterproductive. It can't last.

It's already debatable whether to bother flying on trips < 500 miles in the US, given time, price, and hassle factor. As pricing and operational policies make things worse and all but "gotta-go" travel becomes debatable, the airlines will feel the squeeze and the pendulum will swing back.

darthbimmer

That aligns with my own situation as a traveler. My leisure travel is almost all discretionary, but on some trips my decision if and when to go is less price sensitive than on others. The less discretionary trips are things like important family events. Yes I could have skipped traveling cross country for my grandmother's funeral last year (for example) but it meant a lot to my family that I was there for support.

Annual family vacations are important, too. As the costs go up we don't cancel our annual trip; instead we look for other ways to economize. For example, we travel to a closer and less exotic location, or stay at a 3-star hotel instead of a 4-star resort, or forgo a second, smaller vacation during the year.

The most discretionary trips are the quickly getaways that my wife and I like to take about once a month. We like to go somewhere <2 hours flight time for a weekend or long weekend. SFO-LAX/SAN/PHX/PDX/SEA/DEN. This is where we're most price sensitive. As costs rise from $150 roundtrip pp to $250pp to $400pp and beyond we won't take these casual trips. We'll reduce our frequency to 2-3/year, plan them further ahead of time, and stay longer per trip -- all of which reduces the business airlines get from us.

AA_EXP09

Not really-the majority of people migrate for work, money, or family.
Previous travel does not necessarily play into migration.

cbn42

IME, WN has a significant price advantage in short-haul markets, such as within California or within Texas. They are not always the cheapest, but they are the cheapest more often than any of the others, particularly if you are checking in a bag.

Those of us living in California would beg to differ with that. VX has definitely had an impact at SFO and LAX. They haven't had a nationwide impact, but they have definitely taken local market share from the other carriers, particularly UA.

iahphx

My hunch is the airlines know they are losing these "ultra discretionary" leisure travelers and don't care. There's no money to be made at those fare levels. Better to restrict supply and force up fares for everybody, even if they lose some business from their most frequent leisure travelers.

Also, I don't believe there are that many "ultra discretionary" travelers. Oh sure, there are lots of us here at Flyertalk, but the average American doesn't get that much vacation and doesn't take that many leisure trips. Let's face it: if you've got a week for vacation, and want to go somewhere, you don't need a $99 airfare. You'll pay more. Also, as noted, a lot of leisure travel isn't THAT discretionary: weddings, school, etc. These travelers are willing to pay more and if you restrict inventory, you can fill up planes with biz travelers and semi-discretionary leisure travelers. There's no need to "give away" tickets at ultra low prices.

cbn42

I think a lot of it has to do with the possibility of another carrier jumping in and undercutting your prices. In the past, WN, B6, etc., have been ready to pounce and add capacity to any route where the fares were "too high", so the legacy airlines could not force fares up by restricting inventory. Now that there has been a round of consolidation and the LCCs' costs have increased, it is much less likely that someone else will come in and undercut prices. This makes it possible for the legacies to restrict inventory and raise prices without losing market share.