rickair7777

AS is too small to get away with that long term.

You can probably sustain a niche business model, catering to specific customer demographics (ULCC, biz travel, vacation travel). But the days of niche regional legacies are over, too many 800 pound gorillas ready to eat your lunch.

HAL might be the only sustainable example because of their unique geography and brand (assuming they survive this).

Eventually AS is going to have to responsibly team up with somebody. They essentially spent $4B to keep JB out of the west coast... how often can they do that sort of move going forward?

All Bizniz

But, who?
​​​​​​
What do you think is the likely horizon for that to happen?

Will it be in 5 years when they come to realize that is the best option, or will they be proactive and do it early to take advantage of an airline's weakness?

flysnoopy76

With all due respect I haven’t seen much meaningful growing of the brand anywhere outside Seattle even before the virus sent things south. It seems there strategy even before all this was to consolidate into Seattle as much as possible and leave some token regional service in California.
Southwest might well be targeting AA, but I wouldn’t be surprised to see them take a good percentage of our Hawaii market share(once Hawaii opens again), In the meantime we’ll be sitting around with hundreds of furloughs and airplanes parked with no way to react quickly enough.

Costanza

Will be interesting to see if the OneWorld alliance gets much business for ALK in the long run. With the alliance they get American, British Airways, Japan Airlines, and Qantas as partners to name a few. There is also a disadvantage to the 800 pound gorillas. Really hard to make radical changes with all the fleet types. Southwest has the advantage of a single fleet and I personally think that ALK is headed that way. I do thing they need some "clarity" both on the MAX and on business demand to make a decision on the fleet which they don't have right now.

Costanza

I think Southwest will take market share in OAK and SAC for sure. Don't think it will cut into the PNW to Hawaii market too much and Alaska will probable do okay in the SJC and SAN to Hawaii market. LA area and SFO hard to guess.

snackysmores

We didn't have much market share in either places anyway compared to SWA. At any given time there might be one AS plane at a gate compared to 10+ SWA

crjav8er

Since you actually know, why don't you tell all the pilots? This is a small audience and the entire pilot group could benefit from your "knowledge." A quick email to the entire pilot group from your outlook account would work.

NewGuy01

The sad thing is in a lot of markets it will likely be 11 SWA planes and no mainline AS aircraft in a year or two. I'd give the current podcast a good listen. If anything it shows our management team to be, well the nicest way to say it: our management team does not inspire confidence.

av8or

”We are not Southwest” - 💯 true. They’re aggressively responsible. We’re passively responsible.

“We are determined to survive this and take advantage on the backside.” - How? I’ve heard only one “plan” since I’ve been here. “Most West Coast”, and we packed up that slogan like a cheap suit and retrenched SEA long before the Covid. And, I know I’ve heard that “we don’t like to Telegraph our moves/plans. We keep our cards close to our vest.” Passive aggressive? Ok! But JUST passive?

“....we are about responsibly growing our brand.” - to WHOM? The part of PNW market that doesn’t already use us, is unfamiliar with our product?

Before Covid, SEA seemed like it was in full on panic mode to save gates from being allocated to Delta. The big four are gonna be quite a bit leaner in the aftermath too. With a serious reduction in International flying. I would think our little gold nugget of PNW and AK flying would look pretty appetizing to one or more carriers to go after and try and recoup some of their Covid loss.

I’m not taking a “tone” here at all. I’m just saying that words are empty and if “ifs” and “buts” were candy and nuts we’d ALL have a Merry Christmas.”

I dont doubt our ability financially to produce dividends. But, I’ll believe we’re gonna do that through gaining market share when I see it.

tolowgear

Once again you show your true colors. On here to spread your BS line on the union. No union at any airline ever sees eye to eye amongst themselves and rifts occur on many a item and at all levels. This is by far the strongest union leaders we have had assembled in sometime and one that is more than capable of dealing with the ever changing environment that lies ahead and has been going on. One that is more than capable of dealing with a management team that will not cooperate with them during this unprecedented time. Each base/group of pilots here, will for the most part have similar wants and needs. However they also have differences and items they will not agree upon. That is normal and occurs at all unionized pilot groups.

They are in the business of dealing with facts and the information at hand, not some info that is coming from a union busting management plant. But yet it appears that the union busting management plant will continue to come on here and tout the BS line and get their ego stroked and never be able to stay away.