Originally Posted by
AAbuzzard
Thanks for this info (as well as thanks to the other math wizzes such as
astanley). Highly interesting! So if I extrapolate correctly, transporting my 185-pound body across the Atlantic nowadays costs around $20 more than when fuel cost $2 a gallon (let's not dicker about the 15-lbs difference since these are ballpark figures anyhow); add to that another 75 lbs of luggage, and we're at around $35, or $70 RT. Seems to me all those fare increases and nickel-and-dime charges add up to more than that. So, where is the fault in my logic? Or are we not just taking a ride but rather are taken for a ride?
Similarly, the 2.25 gallons of beer in a case of Miller Light that now sells for $144 on board weighs somewhere around 10 lbs, give or take a bit. I'd assume that the wholesale cost that AA pays for that case is in the single digits. The fuel cost to haul the suds to Europe is less than $4, just eyeballing the numbers. That translates into a per-can cost of around two-quarters. Let's see, 50 cents vs. six bucks is about a 1,200% mark-up, correct? Hmmm...
I can hardly wait to see how my post will be dissected and torn to shreds, because there MUST be something wrong with my reasoning--AA wouldn't stick it to us like
that.
This sort of analysis rapidly becomes painful and navel-oriented, but...
I'm going to use my personal favorite BOS-LHR flight for all the below examples. Assumptions:
* astanley weighs 253# (that's this morning)
* A seat in Y weighs approx 31# (Recaro long-haul class seats)
* A seat in J (NGBC) weighs approx 98# (derived from a PowerPoint on the CL6510)
* A seat in F weighs approx 145# (derived from the same PowerPoint)
* Food/beverage allocation, by class - 16/28/48
astanley's carry on weighs 15#
astanley's checked luggage weighs 28# (that's my one week standard bag)
So, by class, to move my gentleman-of-luxurious-proportions self from BOS to LHR:
Y: $260
J: $320
F: $371
Now, that doesn't even contemplate the "cost per square foot" of each cabin (the fixed infrastructure cost plus by-class modifiers, like higher toilet
assenger ratios and nicer fit-and-finish, plus seats and AVOD), or the nature of the market. That's just fuel-related cost of the fixed weights that I can scrape together. I completely left out any crew allocation, their compensation, benefits... we could go on, and then I'd fulfill my promise of making this painful and navel oriented.
Cheers,
-Andrew
not an airline employee, just a procrastinating finance nerd