Originally Posted by
mother-
MSP, converse fallacy in action-
While it is true that frequent fliers in and around the hubs tend to concentrate on flying Delta, that does not conversely mean that most of Delta's frequent fliers are in/around the Hubs.
Certainly O&D hubs work better than non O&D (hence MEM, CVG, etc. are disappearing). I've never heard of the big market in IND (or Tampa) but the rest of those 'focus cities' (you somehow left out NY and LA, btw) are east/west coast, and likely to feed into the transcons in question...
No, you misunderstand my point. Look at the population of "high income" FFers. One of them located in ATL/SLC/MSP/DTW/etc. might use DL as his/her primary program with 90% probability whereas someone from the same "high income" FFer group located in NYC/SFO/LAX might use DL as the primary FF program with only 25% probability. Many of the "high income" FFers taking transcons don't fly DL. If their companies are buying cheap fare tickets or have good corporate contracts, these people aren't spending a lot of money on DL. A monthly transcon at $400 RT is only $4800 in annual spend but about 60,000 MQMs. To expect regular free upgrades to BE might well cost DL more in benefits than these people are contributing to DL's profits.