Originally Posted by
bseller
This is a very valid point.
The reason, IMO, that they will be surprised is that the HouCrew doesn't see how people CAN go to greener pastures. What other pastures are there when you hub at IAH, CLE, EWR and GUM??
Dave
I suspect that if one does the actual math there are more travelers that fly in aggregate from non-hubs than from hubs. For those of us that don't live in a highly captured hub (ATL, MIA, EWR - tho other choices for NYC, IAH, ORD, SFO, CLE) we are almost always (unless flying to a hub) going to have to connect. In that case, it really makes no difference. The current UA management seems to not see that based on their approach to competition. If I have to connect then where you do it often has little impact on travel time. An extreme example - I was just looking at PSP-DCA and the difference between connections that look "straight" and a rather weird looking PSP-SEA-DCA on AS maxed out at about 1.5 hours for the departure times I needed. Service levels and value/cost really come into play for most of us. It really takes an amazing level of obliviousness to the customer base you serve to understand so little of them.