Originally Posted by
Feng
Good summary. Looking at the big picture though. Traditionally airline costs are 30% for airplanes, 30% for fuel, and 30% for payroll. The first two items the company won't be able to do anything about. The last one though, being the ULCC like it is with low RASM, that's where it'll need to be significantly lower than non ULCC competitors. If they staffed and paid the airline (not just the pilots) like a legacy airline, that profit would shrink away rather quickly.
Hell, even the janitors in Miramar, if they weren't outsourced, can come up with fancy charts and numbers that say if Spirit paid the 10 of them $1 million a year each, it'd still be huuuugely profitable company. But it just ain't gonna happen.
I think you're the only ones counting that retro check, because I doubt anyone cares.
The only thing that matters is what the mediators, arbitrators, the members of NMB, and the president thinks. And if Spirit has indeed proposed wages and work rules similar to it's counterparts, and if they consider the counterparts are Allegiant, Frontier, and Sun Country. There will never be a strike because the company will have deemed to be negotiating in good faith. I'm sure your union will do their best to compare itself to United, Delta, AA...etc, but once the revenue comparisons are laid out, I just don't see it happening.
Good luck though.
Yeah, I was being facetious with the retro check. I just looked up flights from Houston to Vegas. On Saturday (fight night), Spirit is $59 one-way. United ranges from $81 basic economy to over $2000. On the Friday of Labor Day weekend, Spirit is $169 and United ranges from $235 to over $1000. I am under no illusions that Spirit will keep the ticket price the same. Using my previous example of an $85 an hour raise, Spirit would have to raise ticket prices 46 cents to cover my portion of the flight. Spirit could even raise tickets $20 and still be well underneath the average price going to Vegas. We would still be an ultra low-cost carrier. It would just cost a consumer slightly more money to go somewhere. If Spirit were smart, they would just increase the bag fee by a dollar and they could keep their "low ticket price" image.
I believe I saw somewhere that the company does not consider allegiant our peer. They do consider Frontier, Southwest, JetBlue, Alaska, and Virgin to be our peers as well as the big three. We will see how that plays out. I do agree that it's basically up to the mediator as to who is being more reasonable. Last time we were released in a bankruptcy environment when we were asking to be paid more than USAir drivers. The mediator finally got tired of the company shenanigans and let us walk. I see the company making the same mistakes as last time so we will have to wait and see how farthe mediator let's it go.