What a tool.

 

King Soopers doesn't

 

​​​​​​Damn, nailed it! 🤣

Old Frontbutt is getting more classy by the day. It's like building a mansion and getting excited about adding outhouses around the the property when you actually wanted new bathrooms! Definitely less excited at the possibility to join with these new developments. Of course the best case for all 3 of us is to remain separate.

Moving to a bunch of air-stair gates and people actually ok with it? Sure, maybe at some village in Mehico, but Den?!?! SMH.

​​​​​​

 

I heard Jetblue won’t have any either!

 

This move has nothing to do with turn times; we all know that's a bunch of BS. That's just management's 'story'.

This is all about cost. Airports charge less to use ground gates vs jetbridges. Some beancounter at F9 probably negotiated a $200 per flight discount to park at ground gates vs jetbridges.

 

No doubt. All Frontier managment can think about is cost cutting. That's how we opperate our A320 for half the cost of United.

 

Well seeing as we could have save $300 per flight if we boarded via a folding ladder purchased from Menards instead of a ramp, I think we made out pretty well.

 

... pulling up the numbers from the 2021 annual reports
F9
CASM 8.10
RASM 7.67
UAL
CASM 14.36
PRASM 11.30 (passenger RASM)
TRASM 13.79 (total RASM)

I'd use UAL's PRASM, but they also have quite a bit of cargo revenues which is why the TRASM is 2 1/2 cents higher than PRASM. I couldn't find any cargo revenues in F9's annual report.
Both F9 and UAL are losing money on every seat mile flown, but F9 did a bit better than UAL in 2021 (.14 cents better per ASM)

I expect UAL's CASM to fall a bit in 2022 due to cuts in express flying. UAL didn't break out express numbers, but in previous filings, express CASM was considerably higher than mainline CASM.

RASM for both airlines should rise in 2022. UAL has the advantage of international markets opening up and a marked increase in business travel (based on what Delta stated in their Q1 earnings release). From Delta's earnings release:
Business travel recovery boosted by improvement in corporate: Domestic corporate sales* for the quarter were ~50 percent recovered, with March improving to ~70 percent versus 2019. International corporate sales for the quarter were ~35 percent recovered, with March improving to ~50 percent versus 2019. Internationally, Transatlantic improved the most as European countries reopened.
• Premium cabin revenue recovery outpacing Main Cabin: Premium products continued to lead the recovery with Domestic premium revenue approximately 100 percent restored to 2019 levels in the month of March. Domestic and Latin premium product revenue recovery outpaced Main Cabin by approximately 10 points during the March quarter.

Neither F9 nor UAL have posted Q1 earnings yet.

As another RASM comparison, in 2019, F9 had a RASM of 8.92 and UAL had a TRASM of 15.18 (PRASM of 13.90)

Yes, F9 has a considerably lower CASM. But they also have a significantly lower RASM.
I could post that UAL's RASM is almost twice as much as F9's RASM, but it doesn't tell the full story. Same for just talking about CASM.

 

You will also need additional ground personnel to herd the pax on the ramp. At least 3 (if not more); one to man the gate reader, and one each for forward and aft boarding. With a jetbridge, you only need one person to man the gate reader.

So the savings will likely be fairly elusive unless F9 chooses to not hire enough ground personnel. Which will mean much longer turn times as you have to wait for enough ground personnel to board and deplane aircraft. It looks like tripping over dollars to save pennies to me.

It should be interesting to watch an aisle chair passenger get boarded/deplaned on a crappy weather day.

 

I'd like to see that math. If true then F9 would be wiping UA off the map in the U.S.