It also didn't help that Spirit flew into the major airports - with their higher fees - rather than the smaller airports most other low-cost carriers do.
Nor that Spirit - and low-cost carriers - face increased competition from the "Basic Economy" offerings from the major airlines.
I think if JetBlue had acquired Spirit they'd be just as likely to have failed now - 'cause they'd have also taken on Spirit's debts.
Fuel prices have been a sticking point for many industries for decades. In the early 1980s, the President of our company sent a directive to my bosses to evaluate alternatives to diesel fuel which we purchased in bulk for a specific process - millions of gallons per year. I ended up with the assignment. After a few days of collecting purchasing and usage information and simple arithmetic, I determined that the price of diesel fuel would have to rise to $0.32 per gallon (even if the alternatives did not also experience similar price increases) before changing would become feasible. Our then current price was about $0.18 per gallon. Compare that to today's prices. All fuel and energy prices are much higher.
Everything would cost less if fuel prices were lower. There is nothing to stop the long-term increase in oil prices. Airlines and other major fuel users know this. The hedging you speak of simply results in occasional jumps in customer prices that the airlines hope to blame on someone else. I have long been skeptical of airlines as investments. I always thought they were gambling on their fares and passenger demand.
Congratulation for outlasting some of the airlines you worked for. That indicates you are good at your job. At least you haven't clipped a truck and a light pole while landing.
TDS, TDS, TDS...obviously David is a life-long democrat...not. One has to ask; are these commentators bots programmed with the same old crappy responses with no thought process involved? It must be great to be a trump supporter where every problem faced is either a result of Biden/Obama presidency or TDS as the answer.
If so, riddle me this: Was it Biden's fault, Obama's fault or TDS that caused trump shuttle to crash in the 90's? I'll wait patiently.
Thank you for your attention to this matter.
Nice article David, well written and on point. No one thing is ever as simple as the TDS logic (there's an oxymoron for sure).
"...do consumers really benefit when “all restaurants are Taco Bell?” Now there's an elitist democrat phrase if ever I heard one. Because cheap flights are so, so... trashy? It's like TrumpRx or something. This piece hits all the Democrat talking points: the merger would have failed anyway; it wasn't Warren's fault (despite the typical Twitter doublespeak); it's the Iran war; Trump loves "creative destruction", etc. etc. Boy do I miss Walter...
Spirit and JetBlue had significant overlap in their routes, fleets, and customer bases. That's why the merger would have violated anti-trust laws and was stopped by a Reagan-appointed judge.
As I stated in my comment: Spirit - and other low-cost airlines - are facing competition from the major airlines with "Basic Economy" offerings that are aimed directly at Spirit/JetBlue/et al... Spirit did themselves no favors by flying in to the major airports instead of secondary/smaller airports, so their business model was already faulty from a cost perspective.
TrumpRx has nothing to do with this, but to note: TrumpRx is quite literally just a branded website where previously-existing rebates are listed (a la GoodRx).
And who's Walter? Is that someone from "Racket News", Matt Taibbi's site? If yes - this is "The Racket News", which predates "Racket News" by many years.
It also didn't help that Spirit flew into the major airports - with their higher fees - rather than the smaller airports most other low-cost carriers do.
Nor that Spirit - and low-cost carriers - face increased competition from the "Basic Economy" offerings from the major airlines.
I think if JetBlue had acquired Spirit they'd be just as likely to have failed now - 'cause they'd have also taken on Spirit's debts.
Fuel prices have been a sticking point for many industries for decades. In the early 1980s, the President of our company sent a directive to my bosses to evaluate alternatives to diesel fuel which we purchased in bulk for a specific process - millions of gallons per year. I ended up with the assignment. After a few days of collecting purchasing and usage information and simple arithmetic, I determined that the price of diesel fuel would have to rise to $0.32 per gallon (even if the alternatives did not also experience similar price increases) before changing would become feasible. Our then current price was about $0.18 per gallon. Compare that to today's prices. All fuel and energy prices are much higher.
Everything would cost less if fuel prices were lower. There is nothing to stop the long-term increase in oil prices. Airlines and other major fuel users know this. The hedging you speak of simply results in occasional jumps in customer prices that the airlines hope to blame on someone else. I have long been skeptical of airlines as investments. I always thought they were gambling on their fares and passenger demand.
Congratulation for outlasting some of the airlines you worked for. That indicates you are good at your job. At least you haven't clipped a truck and a light pole while landing.
TDS, TDS, TDS...obviously David is a life-long democrat...not. One has to ask; are these commentators bots programmed with the same old crappy responses with no thought process involved? It must be great to be a trump supporter where every problem faced is either a result of Biden/Obama presidency or TDS as the answer.
If so, riddle me this: Was it Biden's fault, Obama's fault or TDS that caused trump shuttle to crash in the 90's? I'll wait patiently.
Thank you for your attention to this matter.
Nice article David, well written and on point. No one thing is ever as simple as the TDS logic (there's an oxymoron for sure).
"...do consumers really benefit when “all restaurants are Taco Bell?” Now there's an elitist democrat phrase if ever I heard one. Because cheap flights are so, so... trashy? It's like TrumpRx or something. This piece hits all the Democrat talking points: the merger would have failed anyway; it wasn't Warren's fault (despite the typical Twitter doublespeak); it's the Iran war; Trump loves "creative destruction", etc. etc. Boy do I miss Walter...
Where to start...?
Spirit and JetBlue had significant overlap in their routes, fleets, and customer bases. That's why the merger would have violated anti-trust laws and was stopped by a Reagan-appointed judge.
As I stated in my comment: Spirit - and other low-cost airlines - are facing competition from the major airlines with "Basic Economy" offerings that are aimed directly at Spirit/JetBlue/et al... Spirit did themselves no favors by flying in to the major airports instead of secondary/smaller airports, so their business model was already faulty from a cost perspective.
TrumpRx has nothing to do with this, but to note: TrumpRx is quite literally just a branded website where previously-existing rebates are listed (a la GoodRx).
And who's Walter? Is that someone from "Racket News", Matt Taibbi's site? If yes - this is "The Racket News", which predates "Racket News" by many years.
Nicely written, well thought out article but then you slipped into TDS. Get a good editor to help you improve your product.
Anybody with a functioning prefrontal cortex is anti-Trump.