Originally Posted by
ashill
I mostly hear you, but I do think there's a lot to be said for patronizing a smaller, more-regional company. Having smaller companies in any industry that are enough of a threat to the oligarchy to cause real competition is good for consumers, so if everyone in Seattle just goes to Delta, we'll all be worse off in the long run.
Having grown up on the east coast and for 20 years here in the NW I can "see" the difference. In the NW people are very brand loyal to the NW, corny but as AS purports " home town airline" and for years that really worked. And for the most part international travel used SFO/LAX as the gateway to Asian. Whereas on the east coast people tend to change much faster, along with the numerous mergers/BK's and "loyalty" was not the bigger issue more of convenience. Shuttle to NY/BOS/PHL how many times has that changed?
Now the Asian money is pouring into the NW, travel has changed and DL needed to grow to sustain itself. Going eastward was crowded so "go west young man". Soft target was Seattle.
Now AS needs to grow up folksy flight service is not hacking it, in fact service in the cabins suck at least up front. Clubrooms are old, dated and lame.
For me I chose to stay the course with AS for two reasons, I am super close to MM and their schedules work for me. Or did I adjust my flying years ago around AS?