I think that these sorts of questions need to be asked. This sort of diversification exposes the company to a wide variety of new risks that the airline employees are completely unable to mitigate and makes us subject to ecomonic conditions that could “harsh the buzz” of a well-performing airline should problems arise in one or more economic sectors that formerly had little or nothing to do with our success.

I’ll admit that the opposite could occur wherein the secondary businesses could bolster the airline side should it experience hard times, but I would expect that a few family fun centers, golf course software and a hotel in Punta Gorda would have only a marginal buoying effect and would do nothing to stop our management from taking the traditional actions (furlough, etc.) if the airline were to stumble.

In other words, the Allegiant airline employees are being subjected to new and unnecessary risk for which there will be little to no benefit.

Do I hope this works? Certainly. However, I am well aware that every time that an airline has tried this sort of thing, the arrangement found itself on the ash heap of history.

The company isn’t necessarily going “all in” on this, but with past and planneded CAPEX for these projects likely to easily exceed half a billion dollars, or about 25% of the company’s market capitalization, they are not exactly proceeding with caution.

If the union is expending resources to question this sort of behavior, I’d say that it is money well spent.