Originally Posted by 24left

Further to some excellent observations made upthread…..

1. Regarding pax who do not want to pay for a seat assignment with their Tango ticket, we can assume it’s because it costs more. This means they do not see the "value" in the $ amount being asked by Air Canada. Either they don't understand the elements of what's included with each ticket and what's extra, or they already know and still make the decision that the additional cost is not worth it.

This is a branding/ image/ value problem. Sometimes, effective communication can help change that. But that may or may not be AC’s objective.

(BTW, the unintended consequences may be less people paying for Preferred seating once they saw Tango ticket-holders seated next to them for free due to GTE)

2. Regarding pax who will buy Economy without even considering Premium Economy, IMO, a similar issue applies. Either they were not aware of the PE/PY cabin, or if they were, maybe they did not understand the value proposition. If some Y purchasers knew about PE but still made the decision not to buy a seat in that cabin, then perhaps they did not deem the added cost to be worth the added service/amenities/seat comfort etc.

Again, this is a branding/ image/ value problem. Sometimes, effective communication can help change that. But that may or may not be AC’s objective.

When I observed a nearly empty PE cabin on one of my TPACs (only 2 pax in 21 seats), I wondered why. I spoke with a few people about it and more than one had this interesting answer:

Air Canada is making money on those who buy higher Economy fares elsewhere. There are those who believe the lowest cost ticket is on the usual OTAs, so they buy there and in many cases, I assume they save some money. Further, one person said, the PE cabin is not always offered as an option on these sites, so what looks like a low Economy fare may not be the lowest fare available on that particular date. So they bought what they thought was the best fare, but there was a better one they didn’t know about.

Air Canada is making money on the employees who must buy the “economy” fares. Sometimes, that is clearly defined as Tango only, other times it’s Flex (but not necessarily G, could be M,U or H). Premium Economy may not even be considered - even if it the same or lower than Flex, for eg., on a particular day or flight.

Certainly the PE cabin is now “less empty”, but in fact, I am not sure Air Canada wants to spend money “communicating” this as they are making money off some similar or higher-priced Economy fares - and we all know, Y has a lower customer service cost onboard.


3. Regarding density on things like the HD or what other airlines are using to fly people to say, Iceland…..

YYZ-KEF is approximately +/- 5 hours. Icelander is using a 757-200 for the route. Is the 320/321 that WOW plans to use really any different?
As for Canadians asking to fly WOW, well, I would say their initial pricing is the attraction, especially when Icelandair is more than double on the same dates (in May) on the same routes.


Bottom line: Humans have a pretty high tolerance for discomfort as long as they can rationalize it.





Dorian, you and I discussed this a few times over the past year. We know others agree with us. However, despite the passion that AC FTers generally have for Air Canada, either the forum or some members are not liked by Air Canada and therefore, I.M.H.O, AC will not consider us to be valuable brand ambassadors.

AC sees the world and its place in it, differently than perhaps we do. Yes, as mentioned on this forum, maybe it’s a culture thing over there. Who knows.

I don’t believe that AC hates us (as a group). They may be annoyed with some individuals.

I am not sure AC sees any value in FT - beyond any interesting ideas that may get posted here by the very smart and often brilliant AC FTers.

I find that rather sad, but hey, I get it. It’s business and we’re not friends.
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