eponymous_coward

Taking the advice offered to start a new thread... here's a starting point.

Me: I'm an occasional VX flyer (if they had picked SEA to do expansion, I would have likely flown them more, but stops at LAX/SFO for EVERYTHING is a no-go), and to be honest, SEA based, lots of West Coast travel and I fall into the "leisure enthusiast" group AS wants, and fly with them plenty already, so I will stick with AS.

Yeah, it sucks that the VX technological and cultural distinctiveness will be absorbed into the AS Borg but I wasn't paying high three-four digits one way for F tickets, and I bet if more VX customers had been, VX wouldn't have been as receptive to a sale. The market for an ultra-premium F product on shorthaul/midhaul is very much unproven as far as I can tell, and from my personal experience... well, I DID use to do a fair amount of $50/100 MC->F buyups. Also, presumably AS's bean counters did the math on a transcon premium subfleet ala Mint and found it wanting.

How about you? Where are you going to? Going to pine for SRB's next try at an airline?

mdosu

so where do you tend to go from Seattle?

I used to fly VX often (SFO-IAD). But with a kid, I exclusively fly Southwest as it's a much easier boarding process with a kid and I like the baggage policy. I don't even mind flying out of OAK.

eponymous_coward

Lots of West Coast with occasional midcon/transcon/international (in that approximate order).

I tried VX and UA doing things like SEA-SFO-LAS for a bit. Nope. ATC holds just aren't where I'm at, baby. I'm willing to fly VX, AA or WN, I've even done NK when the price is right. B6 would be fine but I rarely go anyplace they fly to.

DL hasn't really appealed to me out of SEA because MQDs and "the award costs whatever we think it should today". Thanks but no.

PDXPremier

I am in a similar situation...."leisure enthusiast"....earn my AS status mostly on mileage runs that turn into pseudo-mini vacations. I left UA when I realized I'd lose my elite status if I didn't spend more $$ and that's not going to happen so AS was a natural place for me to land since their miles-based program is what works for me. I'll take a slightly inferior F product (compared to VX) if that means I can get upgraded for free since I never buy F tickets and am too cheap to pay a few hundred dollars to upgrade. AS isn't perfect by any means, but it works for me.

Eastbay1K

Sticking with AS. When I stray (I just took my second Mint flight, have an occasional WN flight, etc.), it shouldn't affect my ability to keep AS status.

StirredNotShaken

As a leisure flyer (Elevate Gold), I went to AA to earn EXP and realized that it was a mistake (ESPECIALLY IN F) when compared to VX. I've since tried out AS F and was happily surprised by the quality of service and food. The majority of F flight attendants were as good (sometimes better) than VX's F crew.

I'll be moving to AS for the remainder of this year and going forward. It's also hard to beat their distance-based program and excellent service.

But I will miss VX and how happy I was to fly on them.

jimmygottfredson

I'm a "working for the man" travel enthusiast . My Delta PM status will run out in Jan of 2019, and I should re-up Elevate Gold / AS MVPGOLD through Jan 2019 as well. Having both until then works fine for my schedule. Been PM with Delta for years and don't see a future there.

I've really enjoyed both AS and VX last 18 months, and will stay with them until 2019... or beyond. The second half of 2018 I'll take a harder look. Being based in Sacramento is not ideal, but I might consider UA if things got better for them. I'll fly WN for feeder flights or short west coast legs if need be.

I think one of the interesting questions will be if AS builds a feeder route into LAX or SFO. Right now you need to be "in the area" to really utilize the VX network. If VX had feeder flights into LAX, SFO, + AS network, + credit on AA flights for odd routes, + current AS FF program = a compelling proposition for California flyers.

worldwidedreamer

For what it is worth, as a SFO-based UA Gold or Plat depending on the year...I look forward to landing on AS. Neither VX nor AS offered the combination of destinations or frequent flier program that worked for me. As a combined airline I look forward to being a happy customer.

HomerJay

Alaska for now.

The loss of Virgin's F transcon service can be counter-balanced somehow Alaska's mileage based FFP. And their in-flight service is far better than the majors.

B6 is not a transcon option for me, because I'm based in DC and they don't do non-stops from here to any west coast destinations. No way am I going thru JFK or BOS to get to LAX or SFO.

So it's Alaska. And I've been satisfied with them so far.

ptownca

Me ? I'm going back East by the end of the year. B6 all the way. ^^

Except for a slightly too hard seat, Mint is awesome.

Finkface

I'm a leisure-all-the-way flyer. Always in F. Totally loyal to AS until I had my first taste of VX F and I was hooked. I now go far, far out of my way to fly VX. Which means connecting (and usually overnighting) in LAX or SFO just to have my butt in that big old white recliner. Will be doing so again tomorrow, as a matter of fact.

I have cancelled almost all of my AS flights (already upgraded to F) for the rest of the year and rebooked them on VX. Don't get me wrong, I still love AS; I am just infatuated with VX. I will be sad when it (F) goes away and my little affair will be over. And I don't think I am really cheating. They are related after all.

Pi7473000

I use AA and UA for now and VX when I can still. VX had the best service on the West Coast for years. I had to fly OGG to SFO on Alaska in F through PDX and LAX and the service the whole way was awful. I avoid Alaska now. I will continue to fly VX when possible, but the only UA and AA for West Coast travel. Alaska really needs to improve their F class service!

cmd320

Occasionally used VX on flights from Florida (mainly MCO) to the West Coast, and some TX-DC flights, always in F. By far the best F product outside of premium transcon flights. In the past I would route MCO-MIA-LAX/SFO to get on AA international equipment for transcons but as the AA premium cabin product has turned to crap and they now seem to want to route everything via CLT, I don't really use them as a serious option anymore.

I have no plans on moving any business to AS. Their F product is just too terrible for anything longer than 2-3 hours. With B6 now offering Mint from FLL-LAX/SFO, that's likely where I'll be taking my Florida-West Coast business. That will work well as I already use B6 a good bit to position to intercontinental flights from NY/DC.

I have also had some great luck with UA lately and find their domestic F product beats AA and DL in most cases but definitely on non-premium transcons.

tphuang

Sorry to be off topic here, but I find your comment about UA's domestic F to be quite interesting. In what way is their domestic F better than AA and DL? Just wondering, since I haven't flown on their domestic F.

As for the topic on hand, I'm not a VX refugee, but I did enjoy flying on there for the few routes they had from new york. NYC to LAS, I will fly B6 now. NYC transcons and to Dallas, I will fly AA, since my status is there.

GrayAnderson

So, it looks like it's going to be Delta I land at. I'm going to shoot for a status challenge to Gold with them this fall (which should be runnable on segments without too much trouble) to get free SDCs (which I will, in turn, mostly use to dump points to VS...but with those SDCs it becomes a lot easier to pile up mileage/segments for status in both cases).

This was reinforced with the deterioration of the AS-AA relationship starting in January. With a few odd exceptions I'm really not up for playing games as to whether I'll get credit for a certain flight or not (or whether I'll get the same price on one site versus another, etc.). I'll probably get the AS credit card to keep my pile of miles alive over the next few years while I burn through them...but AS just isn't the airline for me.

This isn't to say DL is perfect, but taking a mix of product and network it's the best I'm going to be able to do. In a few years, if/when JetBlue gets a larger Mint network (and if/when they make it so you can book a ticket out of RIC to BOS and then onwards in Mint) I might switch. But B6 isn't there yet and while I love that product, neither their network nor their baseline product nor their FFP suits my needs.

AS, in the meantime, simply has the wrong network for me, and with the apparent slow loss of AA...I'll dump the occasional AA flight there but as I said I'm really not thrilled with where AS' partnership is going. Again...wrong product, wrong network, and (partnerships notwithstanding and some of those being utterly useless) I'm not thrilled with the FFP.