Shareholder

Why should AC give YEG more nonstops if the traffic won't support it? If you lived in a comparably sized US or European city, you'd likely have only a couple of nonstops, all of which would be to the hub city of the various airlines serving it. WS has an advantage in YYC and YEG because it cultivated the hometown carrier image after killing off CP. AC has always been seen as the outsider and will never be able to satisfy the fickle wants of Albertans.

erasmus99

I commute fairly often from YEG-Abby/Vancouver. I, like most western customers, just want the best deal. Having to go through Calgary to get to Abbotsford on AC (when they flew there) as opposed to a direct WJ flight was always a non starter for me. Why stopover if I can do it direct with WJ?

At first, I was trying hard to justify flying AC for my AP account. So I did where I could. But after a while, the connections and better service made me prefer WJ, despite the fact there is no loyalty program on WJ.

Frankly, the service at AC needs to change dramatically from the ground up if it wants to "win" over people - be it westerns or easterners.

lynchpin_yyz

And yet there are an awful lot of resentful or unhappy AC workers. (Or at least there a few very loud ones in cahoots with the union bosses.) ... What AC management (and most companies' management for that matter) seem to miss is the fact that monetary compensation is way down on the list of what makes a happy employee.

And where happy employees matter is when things go wrong and a (semi-)smiling face is there to help you out.

arf04

I agree that WS is seen as the "insider" airline out west. My airport is YQR and one of the things that I have noticed over the years is that AC has not tried very hard to compete with WS on many of its western routes from here. Demand is one part of the equation for sure, but when I see that most of the YQR-YYC, and return, flights are oversold or completely full on most days then I figure that AC can do more with routes like that. I have heard more than one story of people who get rerouted to YYZ on a red eye and then back to YQR in the morning as the non-stop is full or canceled, or their inbound is late and they miss the connection (the long route, rather than waiting 1-2 days to make the 52 minute hop to YQR). The YYZ flights do not seem to do nearly as well as the western ones from here, but surely AC could maximize demand and either use bigger planes or add a few extra flights.

WS is just terrible for eastern connections from here, however, unless you want to fly complicated and long routings.

tcook052

The underfunded AC pension plan, you mean? The one those same AC workers are worried about? That AC pension plan? And no, SH, that's not AC's only problem but it's one of them.

TheGreatestX

The traffic won't support it? How can WestJet do four daily flights to both Kelowna and Victoria from Edmonton, yet AC has none to either, not even Jazz... WestJet can still do double daily to Vegas, while AC dropped their twice weekly. We have the traffic, we just choose to fuel it through the airline that better SERVES Edmonton.

anti_ice

I find it interesting that many posters are mocking others that CHOOSE to fly westjet because of, for whatever reasons that might include a better corporate image, better service onboard, and better customer service on the phone and internet.

I completely understand why people would choose WJ over AC. It seems others do too, as WJ seems to be growing and AC is shrinking.

The primary reason, I fly AC is because of overseas J class. That is a benefit to me that WJ cannot yet offer. Flying AC domestically (status, points) allows me to upgrade when I need to fly overseas. If I didn't fly overseas, I would likely fly Westjet. Or alternatively, if WJ joins an alliance with an earning scheme that would allow me to u/g over the oceans on another carrier, then I would likely be flying WJ domestically. AVOD and J for domestic flights are pretty much irrelevant to me…watching 8/10ths of a movie, having an extra few inches of leg room, or getting a $5-10 meal for free are pretty insignificant in the grand scheme of things, IMO.

People who think, as a generality, that most businesspeople don't fly WJ are completely deluding themselves.

I, and others I am sure, have very little respect for the management and corporate culture AC/AP. Due to repeated customer-unfriendly policies that have been put in place, awful communication strategies, disgraceful IT implementation and, in general, the perceived arrogance at the top of AC/AP and the apparent opinion that they have of customers and their own employees, based on anecdotal evidence and personal experience makes me not really enjoy doing business with AC. If all else was equal, I would choose to do business with a company that I respect. I suspect that I am not the only one that feels this way. I feel for AC customer facing staff, who I find are typically great on the whole, as the decline of their companies business means a decline or loss in their job.

Perhaps, with the changing of the guard at AC, things might finally have a chance to change and AC can develop into a company that people respect and of which employees are proud.

Lastly, lcohen999 made a reference that his BiL could have been Elite with all his flying...don't forget, that would be at a significant cost. In actuality, you would need to compare lowest WJ fares to T+ fares. If you are competing on price WJ to Tango fares then E and SE benefits can't even come into the equation. Furthermore, as time has passed the spread between T and T+ has risen, so over time, that extra cost can add up to something significant. At which point you can simply buy the things that are important to you (lounge access, extra flights). Of course, nobody would partake in that kind of accounting and that is what AC/AP banks on, namely, having people think that the E and SE privileges are somehow free.

Anyway, that is my rant for the day. And again, I completely understand why people fly WJ. Over the years I have stopped recommending AC for my friends and family as WJ became more and more, clearly the better choice for them.

ACYYZ/SD

For the same reasons that WestJet couldn't sustain service to two of the largest transborder markets YYZ-LAX & YYZ-LGA. It comes down to deployment of assets on routes which provide the greatest $$$ return.

TheGreatestX

That's not an equal comparison. Those routes out of YYZ are served by multiple airlines. The routes I was referring to are only served by one, and we're talking domestic. There are people in Edmonton (including me), Victoria and Kelowna who would like to fly these routes and earn their Aeroplan points, but don't bother because they can just fly non-stop with WestJet.

ACYYZ/SD

Completely understand your point of view, but the Economics 101 part of my statement is at the core of the issue. With revenue opportunities few and far between, trust me -- if AC could more profitably serve YEG-YLW than any other existing city pair, I assure you they would. With a finite number of assets (aircraft), like every other airline, they are looking for maximum return.

arf04

I think to a degree that you are right, but I also think that AC deliberately chose to try to open up a number of US routes (Philadelphia, for example) and deployed aircraft there that they could have used on western Canadian routes. AC has been less interested in working Canadian routes in favour of transborder and WS has been very good at filling in the gaps. WS, on the other hand, has been very cautious with US routes. One reason I shifted from flying mostly WS to mostly flying AC is because I started to do lots more US and international flying. Once I was back with AC I found the product mostly to be quite decent and shifted much of my domestic travel to AC as well, with the exception of a few western Canadian routes where I will often choose WS for the better schedule. All in all, I don't find that there is much difference in the inflight level of service and, of course, as an Elite I sometimes get things from AC that are impossible with WS (such as an op-up). It will be interesting to see how WS fares when they become more (or try to) of an equivalent to AC with frequencies and international routes.

ACYYZ/SD

It's interesting how posts involving routes take on a political east versus west tone. WS has a very loyal YYZ base of customers, and conversely, I'm sure that "Westjetters" would love to see their preferred carrier fly to Bermuda, West Palm Beach and Havana. It's all about the bottom line.

arf04

I think you are right about the bottom line driving things. Between the two airlines one gets a good sense of what strategy of market development/maintenance they think will best drive the bottom line. I do think AC has neglected the prairie provinces somewhat, or perhaps it is better to say they have not exploited market potential as much as they could.

For me, personally, it is not an east-west thing, but I know many in Regina who refuse to fly AC because they think AC represents the bad old east (and you know, around here, the east starts at about Brandon!). I was a Canadian Airlines devotee at one time, and with Jazz one sometimes sees signs of the various airlines that were once very much western based (such as Air BC), so I don't really see AC as an only eastern Canada oriented airline.

What I notice flying out of YQR is that WS seems to have a fairly consistently folksy type of customer and AC has a more business-oriented and perhaps professionally-oriented clientele. Connecting in YYC or YEG to other flights on either airline I notice no obviously discernable difference in the passengers.

why fly

Perhaps you forget when West Jet flew to LAX we had fares of $99 each way on AC! Go look at the fares now that West Jet has gone!

So AC drove the price down, and West Jet decided to put their plane to another city. Oh and which airline lost $1 billion last year?

Porter is now flying YYZ Chicago... now look at the pice of ORD! Cheapest I have seen on 10 years.

Spounce

You can get YYZ-LAX for $254 for travel as soon as tomorrow, or for $179 a few days out. Pretty reasonable IMO.