Just one man’s opinion. Spirit and fedex have alpa too. Our guys are mad at apa when they should be more upset at our pathetic company. We’re about to report a loss for a quarter that encompasses summer flying, but yeah alpa will solve our issues.

 

so what you’re saying is your professional life is not a noine?

 

I think people are frustrated with both AA management and APA at the same time. It doesn’t have to be one or the other.

 

One we have control over, one we don't.

Our only way to influence the company is through our bargaining agent (APA or another union).

 

UA posted a $1.3b profit while increasing capacity over 7%. They added 50 jets this year and will add over 100 next year.

AA losing money over summer is the same thing that happened to Spirit.

Who knows how this will turn out. Isom has had enough time to put his stamp on the operation, and it hasn't improved. At some point major decisions need to be made with regards to our route network, hubs, etc. to bring about a profitable and sustainable airline.

 

Comparing American Airlines to Spirit Aviation Holdings is asinine. One airline owns zero assets because they burned the entire house down to keep the fire burning. The other has 65 something billion in assets and is making debt payments, in full—on time, but those payments cover the entirety of its yearly cash flow with a lousy few hundred million to spare. Their total cash flow (performance) is what’s concerning when in comparison to their two main competitors. Our saving grace is our business model strongly correlates with where the industry is heading, it’s just being ran very poorly.

As for the rest of your post—I completely agree.

 

I'm starting to agree with Kirby that AA will dehub ORD. Two mid-America hubs seem excessive, and DFW already covers most, if not all, of ORD's routes and unlike ORD is actually profitable.

That's a bit of a cop-out. Sure, AA has assets, but what's the point if expenses consistently exceed revenue? We're approaching a situation where we can't generate enough to keep this machine running on it's own. If the economy takes a **** which is looking more likely than not and the over 65 crowd stops going on the Viking river cruises in business class, then what?

 

it’s not just Ord. We get killed in nyc and lax too, mgmt has admitted that. We essentially have 2 hubs that make money, a few that are good seasonally, and losers. We are dead last or near the bottom in every tangible metric. I’m concerned about union happenings too, but I don’t think guys understand just how far behind U and D we are.

 

JFK and LAX have their places, they do hub to hub and serve major markets but running a connecting hub out of either is really stupid, especially for AA there shouldn't be anything smaller than a 319 at any gates there. If we didn't have the America West mentality we would be going after our strengths, which is Latin America, Caribbean and Mexico. Why we aren't using those new super duper 321xlrs to fly Miami to every mid-sized to large city south of the Equator I won't understand. In many markets we would be the only option to north America and beyond. Why we aren't doing LAX or ORD to south America either? I guess being the 4th or 5th airline to fly NYC to Dublin is the way to go. But what do I know maybe the economy in South America is just that bad.

and APA is just a management training program.

 

There was a post I read on Yahoo Finance discussing AA’s performance numbers in ORD. It’s a profitable hub. They do not lose money in ORD. LAX the graphic showed AA having better CASM than UA and DL, everyone lost money in LAX (lower RASM). Apparently we get absolutely smoked in NYC. They intentionally fly expensive LGA slots with RJ’s so they don’t have to invest in the market like DL has in JFK/LGA and UA has in EWR. Right now DL and UA are making out like bandits on premium travel in the NYC market. It’s probably why we’ve seen upgauging recently in NY, management following the trends after the fact once again. Btw I bet they continue to upgauge ORD and acquire some gates back.

As to your post about AA’s performance. Expenses exceed revenue in a few quarters but yearly AA makes a lousy profit. I’m not glazing the idea our cash flow is acceptable, but some individuals grossly exaggerate the situation.