Originally Posted by
jsloan
That’s the problem with the airline industry, though. You simply can’t afford to run your business like this. UA absolutely needs seat fillers. If you work out their annual profit and compare it to the number of flights that they run, it’s, what, maybe $1000 per flight? Probably less. As much as some people on this board like to complain about “Kettles,” UA can’t survive catering only to high-level elites. They simply couldn’t make money with planes that were only 10% full. Low volume, low yield passengers are individually unprofitable, but collectively they can make the difference between a profit and a loss.
Oh, I 100% agree, and did not mean to imply otherwise. I fully understand that loss-leaders are significantly better than empty seats for airlines.
I still stand behind UA giving the middle finger to the low volume and low yield market simply because there are so many of them chasing seats based only on price, they become fungible. There is no incentive to treat them well... and the state of the economy cabin, check-in experience, off-shore call centers, bag fees, existence of BE fares, I think all points to a desire to see how low the "bare minimum" really is before they no longer fill their seats.