Alaska: The Little Airline That Could
 

From Seattle Times:

As other air carriers fight for bare survival, Wall Street looks upon Alaska Airlines as the little airline that could.

Like other airlines that have cut capacity in the economic downturn, Alaska is forcing passengers to jostle as they board increasingly crowded airplanes. And starting next month, passengers will have to pay more to check the first bag.

Yet Alaska Airlines passenger loyalty has held, and at its key SeaTac International hub, the carrier is squeezing its competition.

Business & Technology | Alaska Air climbs through industry turbulence | Seattle Times Newspaper

Better be careful of touting that. Airlines like Delta, AMR and LUV all see the importance of that little airline.

Could what?

Apparently that could beat the crap out of the bigger airlines with a similar labor structure/costs; keep passenger loyalty; keep market share; and still not charge $2.50 to use the lav. :)

Now if only the 106 will be recalled.

I plan to attend the shareholder's meeting in a few weeks. Anybody else going?

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Over at the ugly red-headed step-child airline, the pilot group is working to have as large a presence as possible.

Today N530AS joins the fleet. Paying cash for four new 738's seems like we're pretty financially stable. Stock is to high for people to buy also you would lose most of what makes Alaska great if they got bought out...loss of code shares would kill it as well as route structure only profitable with the 73. Food for thought what is AS going to do when the -400's are gone and (theoretically they get rid of the -700) because a lot of the Arctic stations are not approved for the 800's and 900's

Cashless transactions like the NWA-DAL merger and the soon to be UAUA-CAL merger mean that no one has to pony up any money. They just convert the stock on a ratio.

You know it's been touted for years. Any merger would kill the economics of Alaska Airlines. It would just become another PSA, Air Cal, Reno Air dismantling.

It is about control of the market without diluting the market.

The DAM/AS codes share is about as good as it comes without a purchase. I can only see if happening if there is a threat to that Code Share via another acquisition.