LonLH

I have never spoken to this guy before, he did it as a favour. I claim no expertise in aviation except as a general management practioner and customer.
He does not seem to have that high an opinion of LH or that low opinion of AF as you have.

IAN-UK

Some most certainly have the relevant baggage, but are more modest in proclaiming their assets and contacts, less inclined to believe in certainties and much more circumspect in lecturing others.

There again, some puff themselves up to bursting point

Lack

For 22,5k US or 30k UA per long haul segment, I really can't complain much.

FD1971

Flying AA on a nonstop from LHR to MIA for a discount of ~10k for your family looks like a major gain in my book. I cannot comment on AA long-haul F, but take BA quite often, in case LH is not available or too expensive.

I am always amazed how confident they actually sell from time to time, in some cases you stand in line at a LH ticket desk and hear people booking tix for thousands of Euro without a blink of an eye.

Your example with Miami is certainly very extreme. If you do not mind sharing the exact details, I would love really love forwarding it to some folks. I can only imagine that Franz and the lads fly to MIA on that day celebrating the success of Score.

FD1971

I never used the words 'eternal wisdom' , but pointed out that LH is among the industry leaders in several fields, same with BA. I really like how they were able to take over slots and BD to defend their fortress at LHR. Might not be good for the consumers, but should work out well for BA.

But a lot of aviation folks in the city hate BA (mostly for the same arguments you find here for LH) and continue praising the higher quality standards of the competition, like SQ, CX or EK. I will never forget talking to one of the best-selling authors in the aviation industry from the UK (sounds more lucrative as it as... according to him) who blasted BA for the quality of their call-centers, by the way, long before LH closed their call centers in Germany.

FD1971

I really appreciate your input, I learned a lot over the last couple of weeks. ^

Of course, you have to exaggerate a bit from time to time.

So discount my opinion about LH by 20% and make AF 20% better and you probably have a more objective picture.

In the end, as pointed out by N1003, hardly anyone was able to come up with a really lucrative business model in the airline industry, so claiming expertise resulting in a profit margin of 2% is already resulting in ridicule from other industries.

N1003U

Of course we do. I think that is why we spend time here in this forum (besides exchanging a bit of useful information on occasion ).

Though some here take it more seriously/personally than others, I think we fault industry leaders a similar spirit that we fault the poor footballer who screws up an 11-meter kick.

Any job one does not have to do oneself is by definition easy.

On the other hand, if knowledge, experience, and technical training are always pre-requisite to running a complex business, then there are many complex, highly technical businesses today that should not exist. The Ford Motor Company, Zeppelin Group, and yes, even Apple Computer come to mind--all started by "crazy" people who had no idea what they were doing apart from belief in an idea and whose leaders all had, despite appearances, what turned out to be pretty darn good management skills. These skills include having a vision/strategy that people can buy into, flexibility to change (even drastically when necessary), the ability to accept new ideas regardless of the source, and to give customers what they ask for.

Technical skills can be bought by the square meter. Leadership skills are a bit more elusive.

SMK77

Even with those prices you should have choices: there are so many better C products out there and they are all available for miles. Even SQ allows redemptions in what I consider one of the best C products out there.

Lack

Those better products tend to be more apealing to the paying crowd, so less seats available to free loaders like me. Plus it usually means taking +1 connection vs LH.

SMK77

My favorite currency is Krisflyer miles: I moved to Singapore in 2008 and I never had problems getting any upgrade/awards that I wanted - and it's still the only currency getting me into SQ Suites :-)

weero

I chose not to post in this thread as economics is not my field. But you cannot just turn my statement around like this.

I see the devolution of LH purely from a passenger/user point of view and there is nothing peculiar/special about passengers and their expectations in and of an airline.

weero

Except when NRT-SIN is sold out in Biz ... or did I misread that adventure?

weero

Yes I agree.

The German legal system had a multi-decade long spotless start. It took the Kohl administration and its heirs more than 10 years to crack it via cryptic and incoherent laws and constant political pressure.

It is one of the most amazing negative social achievements that happened within a fraction of my lifetime. Comparable only to the thorough abolition of the 4th amendment in the US and all privacy rights, and the degeneration of the Swiss financial privacy.

Rambuster

Any domestic German route on any day of the year.

YuropFlyer

that's part of Luftis "higher load factor" programming.

By increasing the (anyway not sold) C area they're basically cutting two seats per row from the sheet, making their load factor appear much higher than it actually is.