<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by Markonen:
Pucci, I'm sorry if my fact-checking for that little rant was inadequate; I tend to associate the saturday night stay rule with American Airlines, who, quite undisputedly, invented modern yield management with highly restricted fares, frequent flier programs and advanced distribution systems. This started in 1976 when fares were first deregulated in the U.S.

Sweetheart, I wish that I did not remember such facts, but there it is.

I frankly have no idea if European carriers used this particular restriction earlier than the americans. Regardless, the fare structures and yield management methods airlines employ today can accurately be said to be the legacy of Bob Crandall, then-CEO of AA. And that's the picture I tried to paint.

If you are talking sheer economy of scale, you are right. Which european airline can hold a candle to the mammoth operations of the US carriers? I think that the first real free for all that I remember was the Laker Sky Train in 1977. All the airlines that flew transatlantic jumped on the bandwagon. TWA and Pan Am swore that they would never be undercut. Where are they now? So mighty, and so departed. TWA was a very very classy act. Everything was so regulated by IATA prior to that even down to the contents of a meal tray in Economy. I remember that we at BCAL were packed (and we were still flying the 707s and the DC10s ), jammed full. The papers were full of pictures of hundreds queuing to fly the Atlantic on stand-by cheapie tickets. Can you believe that they have not gone up much more since then?

I have a memory of going to Paris in 9172 is of a ticket called an IPEX which could be had for £14 return (S1t night stay!!) available only from 14.00 on the day before you wished to travel. I will not embarass you with how old I was, but yes I remember it well!

Of course, I have a great excuse for not remembering all the details as well as you seem to -- I wasn't even born at the time...</font>