Planespotting From United States, joined Apr 2004, 2706 posts, RR: 5 Reply 1, posted (4 years 1 month 3 weeks 6 days 18 hours ago) and read 584 times:
thank you for that statement captain obvious. hehe. im just playin. But the legacy carriers are often much cheaper, especially when offering connections. Im going from DFW-MSP (roundtrip) on the 5th of November (MSP has little or no low cost carriers to speak of), im flying UAL and im only paying $201.89.
Nearord From United States, joined Jun 2004, 185 posts, RR: 1 Reply 2, posted (4 years 1 month 3 weeks 6 days 18 hours ago) and read 572 times:
Yeah, they are pretty cometitive, but lets look at why the fares are the way they are.
for instance, the IAD-EWR route. Prior to independence's arrival Im sure CO was charging around $150-200 for that one way flight. Now that independence is in the market, they are charging $49. They don't want to charge $49 but they have to because of the LCC. If they didn't, they would lose all of their business on that flight.
Im sure its the same for all the other examples given. I watched the piece as well, and they always leave that part out. Making it seem as though the majors were always cheaper. People seem to have a short memory, When air tran come into TYS fares dropped like a rock, but people then flew delta, because they matched fares. air tran pulled out, and fares skyrocketed again. Then people started complaining about the need for an LCC, well if they had just flown the LCC the first time, they wouldn't have to deal with high prices again. Hopefully they have learned this with independence coming to town. I think that, that is happening all over the country, I think consumers are finally starting to wise up and they are flying the LCC's. Who knows how things will turn out, but don't be mislead by the media into believing that the majors would just cut their fares because they wanted to. They had to.
Star_world From United Kingdom, joined Jun 2001, 1021 posts, RR: 0 Reply 3, posted (4 years 1 month 3 weeks 6 days 18 hours ago) and read 558 times:
It's the same in Europe... the 'legacy' carriers are working very hard to keep up with the LCCs, and (especially in the UK) a lot of the old restrictions, such as Sat night min. stay have been abolished. This means that the legacy airlines are often just as cheap, and sometimes cheaper, when compared with the LCCs. However, what tends to happen here is that the absolute lowest fares (eg: 99p or even less on Ryanair or Easyjet) are a lot lower than the absolute lowest on a traditional carrier. It just depends when / where you're travelling!
Jacobin777 From United States, joined Sep 2004, 12781 posts, RR: 57 Reply 5, posted (4 years 1 month 3 weeks 6 days 18 hours ago) and read 540 times:
Nearord...I absolutely agree, they are cutting fares because of the LCC's. And of course, if the LCC leave that market, they will raise fares, it makes good business sense to do that..maximise profits..lol!!
It was interesting because it was on a CNBC which caters to more sophisticated travelers (theoretically anyway)..and the piece as Planespotting posted..was to show the obvious which might not have been known to the general public...
Also, I asked if other travelers were noticing this price competition..because personally, I would rather pay a few x-tra dollars and fly the legacies...........which I do anway...
Byrdluvs747 From United States, joined Jul 2004, 1107 posts, RR: 1 Reply 7, posted (4 years 1 month 3 weeks 6 days 18 hours ago) and read 524 times:
Hmmm. Let's all think about what the Legacy carriers would be charging if there were no LCC's. We all know that the legacies are only trying to undercut the LCC's. Anyone remember $500-800 transcons? If all LCC's were to go bankrupt in the next year, we'd see a 'Empire strikes back' as far as pricing goes.
I fly HP on nearly half of my transcons because they have good prices, less restrictions, and the competition keeps the legacy's prices down.
CNBC is a waste.
The 747: The hands who designed it were guided by god.
Eugdog From United Kingdom, joined Apr 2001, 435 posts, RR: 0 Reply 8, posted (4 years 1 month 3 weeks 6 days 17 hours ago) and read 479 times:
annecdotal evidence means absolutely nothing - there will be cases when legacy charge cheap fares but you ignore the fact that they will have far few seats availabe at those fares - they keep most seats for high yield business men. According to Ryanair 80% of their seats are at the two lowest price bands!
Also legacy cheap fares often have restriction - typically only part of a return ticket which requires a Saturday night stay. This prevents business people who make short trips from taking advantage of the cheap fares. I am simply astonished that so few people on this website understand how legacy airlines maximize their revenue!!
Where the LCC really shine is that their fares are totally unrestricted one way fares so they are great for business people.
Antares From Australia, joined Jun 2004, 1402 posts, RR: 27 Reply 10, posted (4 years 1 month 3 weeks 6 days 17 hours ago) and read 429 times:
In one focus session on LCCs it was explained that legacy carriers have largely offered their cheapest fares at the very last minute to dispose of unsold inventory, while the likes of JetBlue or Southwest do it in reverse.
The cheap fares are posted weeks or even months before the date of travel, and then they 'book build' at gradually increasing levels until the last few remaining seats are sold at quite high prices to schmucks...I mean customers, who just gotta fly at short notice and will pay almost anything within reason.
As a result, the timing of the transaction is extremely important in comparing low cost and legacy carrier offerings. This is essentially why Southwest quite Orbitz in its early stages, because last minute flyers pulled up its least competitive fares while those on say NW were at their cheapest.
Qantas however has been a major exception to this rule on Australian domestic routes. In March 2001 it introduced an LCC type fare structure that raised the price in terms of the urgency of the need of the customer to fly.
This change caught the dying Ansett by surprise, and together with all the other things that were going wrong for Ansett at that stage (when Impulse was still in the market) it proved extremely painful for them. Ansett did not have the ability through its systems to match the Qantas initiative, in fact, it had traditionally taken its pricing instructions from Qantas, and was totally unprepared for raw pricing competition.
Amazingly by world standards Australia still has two domestic jet airlines flying in a comparativel small market, using similar pricing models, and both making good money.
The arrival of Jetstar has reduced yields for both Qantas and Virgin Blue, but also driven even more passenger onto Virgin Blue on routes where Qantas either no longer participates in a major way (Tasmania and the Gold and Sunshine Coasts) or forbids Jetstar to do anything that might directly harm the parent company, such as on the Brisbane-Sydney route.
I suspect Qantas is reviewing its pricing and Jetstar network options because of this, and I reckon Virgin Blue is working on a major overhaul of strategy as well.
Richardw From United Kingdom, joined May 2001, 2882 posts, RR: 0 Reply 11, posted (4 years 1 month 3 weeks 6 days 16 hours ago) and read 397 times:
....and some low fare airlines do not offer capped fares, like easyJet in Europe, unlike WN in the US and Go-Fly before EasyJet bought it
During the peak summer late August bank holiday weekend flights from LON on EZY can reach very high fares eg LON-NCE £400, LON-IBZ £420 if booked near to the departure date.
Jacobin777 From United States, joined Sep 2004, 12781 posts, RR: 57 Reply 12, posted (4 years 1 month 3 weeks 6 days 16 hours ago) and read 370 times:
as i said, i'm basing my comments on my observations........nothing more, I have used LCC's also..particularily ATA and WN........but for the past 10-15 flights, I've found the legacies (especially AA which is what I primarily use 90%) to be just as competative...
That being said, I do appreciate the fact the LCC's have cheap last minute fares (contrary to the other post). I booked a ticket from SFO to Chicago on ATA 3 hours prior to my departure, and that only costed about $150, where as American was charging me $925...
As for CNBC, lets just say I dont use it to make important decisions in life..lol!!!
Ltbewr From United States, joined Jan 2004, 8522 posts, RR: 16 Reply 13, posted (4 years 1 month 3 weeks 6 days 16 hours ago) and read 349 times:
The fare/yeild management systems of major/legacies, and to some extent WN, can cause the fluctation of fares. Most LCC's may not use fare/yeild management systems or programs as sophicated as majors/legacies. Usually the closer to the flight, the more the ticket will be and that makes sense. The fare management systems will look at the history of a flight over time and balance the number of tickets sold on a given day's flight to maximize income yeild. If a given airlines flight is still not too full, even close to the flight date, then the fare might be lower than one bought a week before. Some have a loyality to a particular airline because of experience and convenience, like a LCC like WN, so even if more expensive vs. a major/legacy, will still go WN.
AlanUK From United Kingdom, joined Oct 2004, 620 posts, RR: 15 Reply 14, posted (4 years 1 month 3 weeks 6 days 16 hours ago) and read 349 times:
The 99p fares published by Ryanair are VERY limited (ie.: 2 seats per aircraft) and are there mainly to attract publicity and enquiries. Traditional carriers have a more conservative approach. BA's £59 return to Paris on an off-peak weekday flight applies to 40% of the aircraft's capacity, which compares very much in BA's favour against Ryanair or EasyJet's figures.
I used to commute between Strasbourg (France) and London. For a long time Air France was the only option, and I was paying an average of £120 return. When Ryanair started the route, I carried on with Air France as Stansted was just too much of a hassle to get to. But AF's average price came down to just £80, I expect in response to Ryanair's aggressive pricing on the route. Then AF's pulled out, and for the first time, I tried Ryanair... The price? £210 return and that was the best price for 4 days!
AF are back on the route since it proved that Ryanair had received illegal subsidies from the Strasbourg's region to start its flights there (I find it quite amazing that AF had the audacity of taking Ryanair to court over subsidies... ) BUT: the prices have remained lower than they were before the competition.
LCCs have helped lower the price of air travel, not just on them, but on traditional carriers too! (I actually feel carriers like BA and AF are in a better position to offer cheap tickets, as they can subsidies their short haul network on the back of profitable long haul routes).
Goingboeing From United States, joined Dec 1999, 4871 posts, RR: 28 Reply 15, posted (4 years 1 month 3 weeks 6 days 15 hours ago) and read 325 times:
This is essentially why Southwest quite Orbitz in its early stages, because last minute flyers pulled up its least competitive fares while those on say NW were at their cheapest.
Actually, Southwest sued Orbitz because Orbitz was listing flights that are not in Southwest schedule. for example, the Wright ammendment says I can't fly WN from MCI-DAL, but when Orbitz had them, they had several flights listed that "changed planes" in TUL or OKC. Aside from being against the law,it had the potential for creating customer service problems.
WN wasn't the only airline that had scheduling that way. Before Delta Express started serving MCI-DFW, Delta offered no scheduled flights between MCI and DFW, but Orbitz showed MCI-ATL-DFW. Also, WN wasn't willing to pay any fees to Orbitz or the others (it's called cutting costs without going to your labor force).
WindowSeat From United States, joined Sep 2003, 1241 posts, RR: 56 Reply 16, posted (4 years 1 month 3 weeks 6 days 15 hours ago) and read 314 times:
AlanUK,
First, Welcome to A.net!
As to what you said, I don't for a second doubt that AF will drag Ryanair to court. They will do it in a Flash, it is not only a way to set things right (justice and all that) but a fantastic weapon to shoot down Ryanair's credibility.
I completely agree what you said about the 99p fares and I prefer taking the majors for a few pounds extra (factor in the cost to get to Luton or Stanstead and the majors are cheaper).
once again, welcome, hope to enjoy your posts. Always keep your flamesuit handy.
cheers
I'm all in favour of keeping dangerous weapons out of the hands of fools. Let's start with keyboards.
GoMEA From France, joined Jan 2004, 181 posts, RR: 5 Reply 17, posted (4 years 1 month 3 weeks 6 days 15 hours ago) and read 274 times:
I am completely with the subject.
Had last may a CDG-BCN return for a mere 100 euros ! EZY was selling it at 140 euros (believe it or not, 4 months before departure !).
Next travel is on CO CDG-EWR-MIA-IAD and return EWR-CDG for only $550 !
Having said that, legacies reacted well to LCC's by offering really good rebates if you book early in advance. LCC's stay definitely ahead on a normal weekday offpeak flight.
Mia From United States, joined Feb 2004, 815 posts, RR: 1 Reply 18, posted (4 years 1 month 3 weeks 6 days 7 hours ago) and read 210 times:
I think this is especially true in Europe. I was trying to fly with HLX from HNV-VCE and it was 450 euros for just one-way. That is insane! Lufthansa was cheaper than that. In Europe the only way that LCCs are cheap is if you buy a lot in advance, in America at least the LCC prices dont go up as much when it gets closer to the flight.
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) BUT: the prices have remained lower than they were before the competition.
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