eponymous_coward

Seriously, you're arguing with someone who DOES QX's route planning for a living. Are you saying you can do his job better than he can, and you know what's going on better than he does, based on being a passenger on that route?

In any event, RNO is a major focus city for WN (they have major market share there, as well as in LAX). AA took over Reno Air, LAX is a hub. UA has LAX as a hub.

Which reduces fuel cost, which is rather important on a marginal route. AS does just fine on prop planes on PDX-Bay Area: longer routes, several of the same competitors (UA, WN).

Airlines start routes all the time that are cases of "um, let's throw at a dartboard and see if we can use this capacity to build out our network". AA is bulking up at LAX because they have little choice: their network is down to their 5 hubs (JFK, MIA, DFW, ORD, LAX) and very little else- they've stripped places like BOS, STL, SJU, SJC and SFO down to the bones.

If you're deploying capacity out of LAX to try and bulk up your hub, and flying RJs, you end up flying to ABQ, ELP and RNO.

The bottom line is the AS/QX experiment of making LAX a focus city for anything other than as a scissors hub for Mexico/vacation routes has apparently failed, or is in the process of failing, and AS/QX have owned up to that and are planning to move the capacity elsewhere. There's a reason why LAX-DCA is such an easy score for upgrades compared to SEA-DCA.

Because there's not enough traffic (you can't pick up any connecting traffic from those hubs, plus there's costs involved. Heck, UA doesn't fly BUR-SEA, and SEA is a MUCH larger destination than RNO). That being said, if anyone could make that work it would be G4, flying beater Mad Dogs out of LGB or maybe B6, since they have their hub there... and they don't even do it.

Rickrich

As a weekly customer who flies this route week in and week out, I have firsthand knowledge of this market, better than most people (I'm sure you know the markets you fly most on quite well too). I see on the front lines exactly what is going on with all of the carriers in this market (fares, flight times, on-time performance, and most of all, comments made by other passengers). When you hear other passengers on Horizon flights saying over and over "Next time I'm flying Southwest", you know you have a problem (interesting how customers unhappy with Horizons' frequently late flights never mentioned UA or AA in their comments). Again, loyalty to Southwest is as strong as loyalty to Alaska (mainline).

Alaska's best source of what is going on at the front lines is not it's employees, but it's top customers (MVP Golds) who understand the market in a way that it's employees can't. That is why I think it's been a fantastic idea for Alaska having it's Gold lunches to hear what is really going on with it's passengers. Congrats to Alaska for doing this!!! These gold lunches are a great idea and I hope Alaska continues them.


Reno a major focus market for WN???? I really don't think so. But it is Reno's biggest carrier, especially since it has a monopoly on the high volume Reno-Las Vegas market. Although AA took over Reno Air years ago, virutally all those Reno Air routes were discontinued long ago.

The bottom line here is that Alaska just couldn't make Reno work, whereas the competition has been able to, for a number of different reasons, depending on the carrier.

But it's clear that Alaska still has interest in the market since they began codesharing the route with AA, rather than pulling out and giving up completely. So there is hope for the future.

Have a great day today!

formeraa

This whole thread is a good demonstration of why companies are analyzing real hard DATA, rather than listening to emotional diatribes from their customers. eponymous_coward's statements are right on target here.

And, as a mathematician, let me point out that a passenger is more likely to be on a full flight. That's simple probability theory (of course, most Americans are innumerate). If you always fly on Friday and return on Sunday or Monday, you might think the flights are "always full". What you don't see is the very light loads on the other days.

Another point is that rickrich buys his tickets 2 months in advance, assuring that he pays very little for the flight. You don't make money selling every seat at the lowest fare. I can fill almost any plane very easily -- sell all the tickets for $1 plus tax.

Hats off to RASMGuy for working two years trying to save Eureka and Redding. That in itself shows QX's attempts to make the route profitable.

COS flyer

And even LAX-DCA could be on the ever shrinking LAX menu. If additional DCA slots come available, there will be additional flights to LAX. Probability is that it won't be AS getting the new slots. I wouldn't be surprised to see MFR go away as it too has been though a capacity cut and has Allegiant competing with them. SJC is up against 700 daily Southwest flights and even Mexico seems to be getting more competition. Not even sure why AS is spending money on LAX.

Anyway, for me, I used the LAX-RDD/ACV flights. I will just shift more over to United. Which today doesn't bother me like it did 3 years ago when UA's service was poor. Chance of a renewal of MVP status starts to fade or if I do it, it's thanks to flights on Delta. And when I come to the PacNW, it will likely be on a United bird now, not an Alaska bird.

And I do get why Alaska has done this, but it seems like LAX is in a full scale retreat and it doesn't only impact one route when they leave. Some of us fly because of a network and if the utility goes away, we will shift to other networks and become loyal to those networks.

While I love RASM's posts...A little dramatic coming from the airline that posted the 2nd best profit margin in the nation AND hit their 10% profit target. Alaska is far from being bankrupt and RDD/ACV was going to drive them there.

sxf24

So AS should be charitable to folks in RDD/ACV because the rest of the company is profitable?

ACVFlyer

I am going to have to agree on this. When I first moved to Humboldt in 2001, I flew QX 5-6 times a year between ACV and SEA. Before the Q400 and the addition of the ACV/RDD-LAX route, QX flew from ACV and RDD to PDX/SEA three times a day on the Q200. The schedule worked great for weekend trips to visit friends in Seattle. I could fly up in the morning or work all day, fly out on the 5pm flight and get to Seattle in time to hit the bars. Sunday I caught the 2pm flight and got home in early evening. Around the time the Q400 was introduced on the route, the mid-day flight was canceled but I was still able to fly north after work.

After ACV/RDD-LAX was added, northbound flights were cut to once a day. Leave at noon and arrive in Seattle in late afternoon. Southbound still left at 2pm. The northbound schedule just didn't work out for me that well. It got into PDX/SEA too late for most connections or I had to use an entire day of vacation for only an extra few hours in Seattle. At that point I either flew on QX when there was an airfare sale or flew UA which offers 6-7 flights a day out of here. I don't fly down to LAX often and when I do, UA has more options throughout the day and flies to more SoCal cities so I can fly to ONT or BUR depending on where I need to be. Those airports are less hectic and more convenient than LAX.

I've been a member of the AS Mileage Plan since I started attending U of Oregon in 1995 and I've had an AS credit card for probably 10 years. I guess I'll use up my miles and dedicate myself to UA. MFR, STS and the Bay Area are too far away to really bother. It will be hard to give up my AS credit card but I guess that is just the way it has to be. With the loss of QX perhaps UA will upgrade to the CRJ sooner than later. Perhaps we will even get the one flight a day between ACV and DEN everyone around here has been begging for. That way we can avoid weather plagued SFO when we travel towards the east.

ACVFlyer

http://www.times-standard.com/localnews/ci_17871372