This take is off… If NK disappears it would open up more gates and expansion opportunities for frontier allowing them to offer more profitable routes.
JB is not merging with anyone in the near future. Even this republican DOJ would not go for a JB merger with anyone bigger…

But lets say you are right… lets say AK wants to expand its horizon east with more european destinations and scoops up JB in addition to their HAL takeover.

That leaves us, WN, G4, SY, XP, and MX

Next to WN, frontier would be the biggest LCC in the country and WN isn’t even LCC anymore... I believe you are underestimating the need people have for low cost travel, Necessity travel as I call it. If you take over every route with cheaper fares some people will choose accordingly. The reality is there’s always someone willing to travel on F9… with spirit out of the picture, it just adds more. If people truly think NK is worse than F9, and NK still has customers, it says something.

As much as we joke, Greyhounds are still running for a reason.

 

There's one problem that you seemed to "assume" away and that's that we can expand. There's a reason why we don't have more gates in major cities - it's not because of NK. If their gates go out to the highest bidder (or worse, AA, UA and DL use their local political power to block anyone else), then we're still the same size (and they're bigger). ULCC has always had a real estate problem.

Overall, I hope you're right. But I don't think so. ULCC is broke. There is no way around it. Not spending on your employees or your gates or your gate agents doesn't work anymore. It had a good run, but now it's time to change/adapt.

BTW - Greyhound really doesn't have competition (is there an upscale nationwide bus service)? And to think, there are people that will take that over F9...

 

You have Megabus and Flixbus, but I think they're only somewhat better than Greyhound.

You want nice buses you'll need to go to Europe or Asia.

I rode Amtrak once and it was a fantastic experience. Love train travel.

 

maybe with the exception of the north east, trains are fine as long as you have at least twice the amount of time as it would take to drive.

 

Definitely concerned we aren't doing very well at all.

 

How about you just wait till the earnings call. People need to take a breath and not just equate a company who is losing a billion dollars a year to what frontier is.

 

The reductions in block and reserve/line holder distribution among other things is pretty concerning.

 

like Barry said before… stop doing things that lose money. In order for us to furlough the far term has to look worse not just a couple of months.

I would rather reduce any losses over September and October by not flying planes half empty then reduce the schedule and break even. That’s not a bad strategy and I don’t see why people are screaming the sky is falling. They have said this over and over we are going to be more disciplined on not flying off-peak days. That is exactly what they are doing.

To be be honest this is a smart move from our airline to not hemorrhage money and end of like the next NK. People need to understand we are not close to where they have been for the last 3-4 years. Can things get worse of course, but there has been 0 8-K’s put out on suggesting earnings not in line with what they had reaffirmed a little bit ago.

all that being said, I just want to wait and here what the near term looks like come the 5th.

all that being said it drives me crazy how they run the airline but I would much rather them be proactive with halting classes and reducing block hours to tread water then take on significant debt.

 

Obviously my feelings aren't brought on by off-peak months being slower. But let's look at a few facts:

We had a large number of COLAs during the peak travel season
We have seen softening demand for domestic leisure travel - especially on the cheap end
ULCC and Basic Econ (legacy) seats are overabundant
Our peers (JetBlue, Spirit) are either in dire straights or only recently *maybe* turning the corner
We have an indefinite suspension in hiring
We are apparently overstaffed

I am not saying the sky is falling, but the shades aren't super rosy right now. It's definitely time to be concerned, and yes we will find out a lot more come August 5th.

 

What magic are you expecting to happen during the earnings call?? There are no earnings. We have lost money. Likely, significant money and we are overstaffed.

We may not declare bankruptcy but we will be in the same condition as Spirit. Furloughs and clinging to the last bits of life until indigo decides what they want to do with the carcass.