knope2001

+1. He's also a former employee who in my opinion has displayed a very jaded outlook for many years about his former company.


I certainly agree that there are aspects of the current dual brands which are frustrating and need to be worked through no matter what. Mastercard Mondays are wonderful, but not being able to use it on flights sold as Frontier is lousy. Stretch should be available to reserve no matter what airline is selling the flight nor what airline is operating the flight. It should be a seamless process to book FF award travel online no matter who the selling carrier nor operating carrier is. I'm sure some of these things will go away with a consolidated brand. However...I think that the issue is somewhat overplayed by the nay-sayers, too.

Sorenson says:
“It’s a branding buffet right now,” he said. “There are some planes with animals on the tail, there are some big airplanes and some small airplanes and cookies are offered on all flights. From a consumer perspective, it is so very confusing.”

Nearly all major carriers...and some of the LCC's...have signfiicant product differentiation between different aircraft and markets. You buy a ticket on airline X....is there IFE onboard? It varies. Food for purchase? It varies. First class and/or premium section? It varies. Bigger overhead bins or tiny overhead bins? It varies. Served by employees of that airline, or of an alliance partner airline, or a regional airline partner, or of a third-party sub-contractor? It varies. I'm not saying this is a desirable thing, but it is a fact of life at most carriers and nothing unique to YX/F9.

Back to the tone of the story itself. I love how we've had months and months of the media saying that two brands is a horrible mess and it is playing into the hand of AirTran. And now that they are consolidating to a single brand...

Sorenson says:
“Whatever Republic does is almost irrelevant”
"AirTran Airways, Midwest’s main rival at Mitchell, is almost certain to benefit as Republic works to combine the Midwest and Frontier brands"

AirTran's Fornaro says something remarkably similar
"Them going to one brand, one way or the other, is going to be a positive for us"

So let me get this straight. Staying with multiple brands (as they are now) benefits AirTran. Combining the two brands into one benefits AirTran.

Very nice, even handed story.