Originally Posted by
scubadu
That has literally almost never been my experience (at least for a very long time). And if you "never checked the competition" how would you know? The one thing WN was brilliant at was marketing that they were low cost...
I once considered getting a companion pass for myself and my wife to use and I did several simulations where I literally found the price on WN to be almost 2X per ticket, relative to AA (or "normal" carrier at the time) and with ZERO benefits (assigned seat, extra leg room, early boarding group, lounge access, etc.) which pretty much negated the value of the pass.
I would be interested to see the parameters of your searches. For years, Southwest neglected its IT and engaged in odd pricing strategies: linear increases in flight prices in the two weeks preceding the flight, even if competitors' prices were much lower; shorter schedule openings and sky-high prices for flights more than a few months out; inability to offer red-eyes because the system could not contemplate a flight which landed after 1 AM CT; the Christmas 2022 systemwide meltdown, etc. Then there was the MAX8 debacle. It has been the contention of many loyalists that those problems depressed revenue, not the core business model.