Christmas Fares
 

Wow is this normal for many fares to completely sell out during x-mas week? I mean this is the very first day and in a matter of hours flights are completely sound out, such as those going down to Mexico. Do more wanna get away fares open up down the road?

I was looking at flights to Vegas and noticed the xmas prices and WGA sold out..........also prices across the new schedule seem much higher than past years. We fly to Florida the day after Thanksgiving and t's normally 1/2 the price it is this year and they are also running more flights MSP/FLL that day than in the past

I grabbed a great deal at 8 am from ISP to PBI - same flight is now over $900 r/t !

This is normal on Southwest for popular routes.

Yup. The economy is on screech and the smart money grabbed up the cheap seats quickly. If you waited a couple of hours, you are likely SOL.

It is always possible that if WN can't sell the seats at the full price, it will open up WGA fare buckets, but if it's a holiday destination on a holiday, don't count on it.

Do you really think that you are the only person looking for a cheap xmas fare?

I booked this morning at 7:00 a.m. pst and flights were open but expensive compared to last year. I don't recall having to jump on flights so fast it the past and they were cheaper last year by a few thousand points.

I didn't see any cheap fares for the day before Thanksgiving. In recent years Southwest has not relented on those fares until later, after disappointing early sales figures. Ditto for pre-Christmas.

IIRC, you (as an expert analyst here) used to think to observe the WGA "sweet spot" was about 12 weeks out, do you think that is still relevant?

Yes. Although for SFO-LAX (fare war with Alaska) it has been as low as 3 days out.

WOW. Had been waiting on the schedule to open up for Thanksgiving, Christmas and NY travel. I am shocked that all destinations are very high. I am looking to buy for family of 4 (3 seats plus 1 free using CP). Caribbean and Mexico are $$, so is FL. It was cheaper to buy with AA for Christmas. I was also surprised to find 4 award seats on the flight I wanted. Yes, AA was cheaper buying 4 than SW buying 3 plus free CP! I bought Basic Economy on Delta for Thanksgiving. Again 4 cheaper than 3+CP.

OK, so they're more expensive at Christmas. I guess that's the specific dates and times you wanted. Were they cheaper the next day, or a different time? Southwest has never said they're going to be the cheapest all the time. So they're more expensive at Christmas. Were they cheaper at Thanksgiving and New Years?

4 award seats on an AA flight around Christmas?! Did you play the lottery today?

We now have 2 threads on the same topic. Basically there are some routes where WN did not release cheap WGA seats when the schedule opened for peak travel days. They did not all instantly sell out at 7am like a Taylor Swift Concert. I saw nothing to/from Mexico around Thanksgiving and I'm sure Xmas is the same. WN plans to gouge you as much as UA, AA, DL if they can.

However there is a way to get revenge. Simply book full fare refundable tix and then cancel when fares drop.

Once again...this is NOT true. They did sell out like a Taylor Swift concert. While not Mexico, I booked peak WGA fares to AUA and BZE over Christmas and Thanksgiving. They were sold out of WGA and priced nearly three times higher 12 hours later.

Not true for you, true for me. Isn't this fun?