Originally Posted by FriendlyPilot

Spirit had 79 planes in 2015 and made $317M
Spirit had 88 planes in 2016 and made $264M
Spirit had 112 planes in 2017 and made $420M
Spirit had 128 planes in 2018 and made $155M
Spirit had 145 planes in 2019 and made $335M

Spirit had 213 planes in 2024 and lost $1.23B

If Spirit's problem is scale then why was it profitable when it was smaller and losing money now that is has scale?

American has scale and it lost money in Q1. Southwest has scale and lost $465M in 2024.

The problem is that Spirit isn't offering a product people want to pay enough for to cover its costs. It has nothing to do with scale nor credit cards. Spirit was profitable in the past without either of those.