Low cost major instead of Regionals?
 

Hello, I am curious on of it would be worth going to one of the low cost majors (Allegiant, Frontier, Spirt) instead of going to a wholly owned regional like everyone else. I would like to end up at a Legacy eventually. However, I noticed that Ameriflight has an agreement with Allegiant and Frontier, just looking for opinions on this path. Btw I am just a CFI candidate still far from actually making this choice, just curious. Thanks

Who is "everyone else?"

You do realize they get a vote by hiring or not. Apply wherever you think you can get an interview and take the best offers. Too many here think they can plan out their careers upon getting a CP.

GF

Good luck getting in with those airlines without any prior 121 experience. Why do you need to go to a wholly owned? They have the lowest pay and worst work rules.

I suggest you look at the FO hiring requirements for the LCCs. Chances of you doing 1,500 or 2,500 or even 5,000 hours flight time as a CFI in a Cessna and getting hired by a LCC aren’t great from what I’ve seen. You need 1,000 PIC turbine time to get up to the big leagues generally.

Fastest path to a legacy is a regional with low upgrade times.

Safest path is an AA WO, but you pay a price and it will take longer.

A LCC will take longer, because it will take time to get to an LCC, and once you get there it will take longer to upgrade, much longer than most regionals. Upside is if you get stuck there it pays better than a regional.

But you will need ME turbine time for an LCC. And there are plenty of regional CAs who cannot even get called by the better LCCs. So you can't just decide to go there, you have to get an interview and get hired.

And yet an astounding number of people seem to be just hanging out at some regional, either counting on flow/CPP/DGI or just assuming that eventually they will have accumulated enough hours that a major will come looking for them. Not even updating those hours on a frequent or regular basis.

You may be more experienced, or a far better pilot, but the interview is likely to go first to the guy/gal hustling the hardest and showing the most enthusiasm - at least until the majors have a whole lot fewer applicants than they do now.

As the Pilot Shortage worsens, what is currently happening in hiring will change.

Currently, you may be able to go directly to an ACMI carrier. In future, it will be much easier to go directly to the LCCs ("Low Cost Majors), or ACMI.

There is also the option of going to -135/charter/fractional directly.

Everyone is different, and everyone's path will be different.

Note: My opinion is that Allegiant is the least desirable of the LCCs.
and
If you go to a regional with a Flow Through, that is the most certain path to get to a major (except currently, ONLY AA has flow through, with Envoy/Piedmont/PSA).

I’m not disagreeing with you, but genuinely curious why Allegiant is at the bottom...

Also, ACMI carriers seem to be a pretty low quality of life from everything I’ve read on the cargo-side of this forum.

Agreed with all shared, best offer you ever get is the one in hand.

I’d also had, much the same way I’ve always heard that “there isn’t any shortage of airline jobs, just good paying ones”, I believe the more I observe that “there isn’t a pilot shortage, just a growing shortage of more experienced applicants.”

Just my .02:)