What mergers do you think should have been blocked and why?

All good points; good post. I really think VX is a good airline with a good
product, but it is growing too fast---and too large. The other Virgin companies---VirginAtlantic, VirginAustrailia (prior to Blue merger), VirginExpress---all have between 40-50 aircraft. VX is going to have 75-100 aircraft in the coming years, and will continue to bleed cash, due to the enormous cost of that growth. If they stopped at 45-50 jets, I truly believe it will be successful and make a profit. They can't overtake UNICAL.

Yes, I hope you don't work for Spirit either! It really sucks at Spirit..16-18 days off and 80-100 hours of credit sucks!

I have never seen the 4 days go away unless a pilot chose to build his line that way based on dropped trips.

Xtra operates under Spirit right now because Spirit is/was having issues with their seat replacement program. A product of growing to fast and not having a plan to maintain or replace a/c seats.

Get your facts straight before you bash another airline... Especially one where guys walked the line and did not cross!

Now let's get back on with the thread topic about Virgin!

United just launched SFO-RDU. I guess it is true. Even if a new market is thought of, United will launch a route there...

All of them. Let poorly managed airlines die. The way things stand now we are left with five very large airlines. American, United, Delta, Southwest, USair. It will be only a matter of time, one of these airlines will run into financial problems due to incompetent management/leadership. What then?

If any of these five mega airlines (soon to be four after the AA/USair merge) fail, the smaller JetBlue, Alaska, Allegant, and who ever else is out there, wouldn't be able to fill the void left behind. The government will be forced to bail them out. The old to big to fail concept.

So again, if you want to put away the rubber stamp, put them all away.

I see the present state of merger mania as a large correction from the previously bailed out airlines and their insane RJ real estate bubble buying binge. Pre merger there were way too many massive network carriers with tons of capacity (especially in the way over hyped
businessman wants frequency" RJ feeders) who'se only purpose in existing was to raid the hubs of competitors and cherry pick revenue of key point to point routes. It worked great when one airline had high cost RJ's and few if any other did. But when they all ended up with a massive RJ infestation all they did was bleed one another dry with high CASM insanity.

Had USAir been allowed to liquidate when they should have been, and the precident set that any other would be allowed to follow suit, the industry would have corrected itself without nearly as big a hit to labor and the surviving airlines would have been in a far superior position to fend off the cancerous supernova growth of JetBlue and AirTran. Now here we are, all draged down to the lowest common denominator (I think it was an AA exec that said the industry is only as smart as it's dumbest competitor), the pensions are gone anyway, most Captains make previous FO pay adjusted for inflation and USAir Captains make current FO pay anyway.

But at least the industry is rationalizing its previous level of drasticly excessive competition (which we both agree, one way or another, HAD to be reduced) and the MBA idiocy of "moving the world 50 seats at a time" has been tossed onto the large trash heap of failed airline manager history.

Mergers aren't the problem, but they are (one of many) answers to fixing the broken US airline model. They have to happen to get to where we need to be, yet of course that's not all that needs to happen. I agree that failing carriers need to go away, be they legacy airlines or beloved start ups and so called LCC's crushed by healthy legacys. Either way, we are well beyond a zero sum game with the fantasy order books of the ponzi scheme LCC's and start ups as well as the fairy tale fantasy Howard Hughes wanna be foreigh EGO airlines rushing in head first to out do eachother to be the hero of Farnborough to see who can order a million more A380's and 787's than the other one. Something has to give, and it will.

Airlines that think they will grow and conquer the world will stop growing and be a shall of their former selves. Some will go away entirely. As it should be. I hope you are right though, and as long as the playing field is level on the policy front, let there be no quarter for airlines that can't make it, and let there be no more bailouts. Not for entitled legacy airlines and not for populist so called "low cost" carriers either.

And either way, there needs to be, and there will be, more mergers.

You have some good points Gloopy. I don't know what the answer or fix is but I know this is NOT the industry or career it was when I started.

Why do people always say "lowest common denominator" on these threads? In my experience it's a phrase rednecks use to look smarter. I make grammar/spelling mistakes all the time, but things like this just make me cringe.

The lowest common denominator when you're adding 1/4 and 1/3 is 12. What the hell does that have to do with our industry?

Maybe people use it just because it has the word "lowest" in it and it sounds fancy.

It's a figure of speech that says, "the smallest, most basic thing in common between these two (or multiple) things is...."

And that is like the smallest, most basic fractional unit between two fractions -- the LCD.

How is that so difficult to grasp?

Apparently, very difficult.

I'm perfectly aware it's a figure of speech. I'm so glad I was able to get one or two redwood rednecks mad about this.

The denominator is just the bottom part of a fraction. It's not a "fractional unit" as you say. I even gave an example above where the LCD was 12. 12 is a bigger number than 1/3 pr 1/4. Twelve. 12 is the LCD. Maybe if I use the words Y'all and such you'd understand me better.

..............."redwood rednecks"? Is that the collective intelligence you have to offer to this thread? Come on. You can be smarter then that if you really give it a try. Drop something on us that will "enlighten".

Unfortunately, in this most "regulated" of "deregulated" industries...where our government looks on airlines as more of a public utility than a business trying to make a profit...IMHO the status quo will continue. The playing field will never be level and natural selection will not be allowed to occur even though it would result in a healthier industry in the long run.

OMG!! You do understand that 4/12ths is the same as 1/3, even though the "12" is "larger"!!!

Holy Archimedes!!

:eek:

You're (your?) probably right (rite?).

Irregardless,<<<<---- yeah, that just happend of their failed track records, the keynesian morons will continue to try and custom craft a grand society with peace in our time no matter the cost.

I think he meant the denominator is larger. You guys are talking about the lowest common denominator, right?

WOW hey look everyone Virgin lost money in the second quarter $ 4 mill!!!!

Oh sorry thats all they ever do sorry thought this was something new my bad.:D:D:D

how long b4 they shut the doors?

Nevermind.......

At the intersection of pop culture and economics, if something is a "hit" it makes money; if it doesn't make money, it's not a "hit". JB was making money and growing after 5 years, say "good night, VA".

GF

+1 Bar, but it's AA, not United that's the target.

Remember Branson and BA are pretty much sworn enemies, the immunized transatlantic BA AA alliance is his Perl Harbor...

Virgin Australia puts pressure on Qantas
Virgin America puts pressure on AA

Here's some not so subtle writing on a Vigin Atlantic jet tying it all together (Virgin Australia was formerly known as Virgin Blue)

http://www1.pictures.gi.zimbio.com/R..._YxJ1hNcjl.jpg

Cheers
George

They lost a lot more than that. Look at their net loss- money ain't free.

They have also burned through 80M of the 160M in unrestricted cash they ended 2011 with.

And that means what?

It means that they have burned through half of their available cash in 6 months.

It means that if you read Virgin's press release, they talk about a small "operational loss." Regrettably for Virgin, they carry a lot of debt. That debt costs money. Hence the comment.

If you want to see how an airline is really doing, you have to look at the net loss/profit, not the operational loss/profit. Virgin has a significant net loss for the quarter they just reported.

Go to the press release section of the Virgin website. It's right there.

I read the full report.

I happn to enjoy reading financial analyis by pilots. Now... what did you miss?

It really wasn't a financial analysis. I just looked at the press releases that Virgin put out and used subtraction. Then I looked at the net loss posted and compared it to their revenue and noted a significant loss.

What did I miss?

No matter how you look at it, how you spin it, VX looses money.

The plan now is to slow growth an focus on making a profit. No more deliveries for 12 mo. It's not gonna be easy, but there is always a virgin to be sacrificed...

One delivery scheduled for March 2013. The next one after that is in September which starts deliveries of that new order from 2011.

"Always a virgin to be sacrificed"........ lotta talk coming from a guy at Spirit.

Are you serious? VA run United or American out of business? You think that's what VA was set up for? With 52 airplanes, A320s at that? With sole domestic services and three Mexican cities, just 19 destinations. And you took all that to mean that VA's "goal that they set out was to put United out of business."

Wow, I'll take a hit of whatever you're smoking............

You are right!!. A lot of talk. See ya on the next qtrly report!!

Branson's stated goal was to run United and / or Delta out of the Pacific where they compete with Virgin Blue. He made other statements directowards running United (pre merger) out of business.

I wouldn't waste your time with shyguy. He was one of the biggest tools to ever wear a 9E uniform.

Thanks DL1067, ...-and there is always one of those-..

My apologies -- your response wasn't bad, and I posted quickly and sarcastically -- I should have taken more time and re-read your response. Here is what I was getting at, you are reading an unaudited report from a company that is not required to report and that is nearly 90 days old. That cash situation that existed then is irrelevant now. The net loss is cryptic and not explained by the numbers, nor narrative.

Virgin America widens 2Q net loss to $31.8 million | ATWOnline

No offense to people working there....

VA is the People Express of today.

Branson has never stated he wants to run United or any other legacy out of business. United, even pre-merger, was and is a very strong legacy carrier, with a huge international network, diverse fleet. VA cannot run ANYONE out of business, simply based on the size and destinations alone. All VA is set up for is to provide an alternate to the bland flying options available in the US, offering a higher class product. You cannot put a legacy airline out of business like United by starting a domestic A320-only airline that does mostly transcons. From day 1, United has been giving VX the headaches, not the other way around.

Comical. Coming from a guy who's never flown with me.

Nice knowing you, Mr. Sept-2010-DOH-at-Delta-thank-god-a-mesaba-flowthrough-because-otherwise-a-tool-like-you-would-never-have-gotten-hired-off-the-street.

I heard your reputation at Mesaba wasn't exactly stellar.

Good day.




You're gonna take his word, someone who has never flown at 9E or VX? He's an arrogant tool who has a serious complex now that he's at mainline Delta, as of 9/2010.

Well, actually, they are required to report certain information to the DOT, including some financial information. A few years ago, they tried (unsuccessfully) to get around that requirement, citing that they were a private company. So now we all have press releases to read with some information instead of an actual 10Q.

If you're arguing that Virgin is putting out press releases that are deliberately incorrect or are misleading because they are "unaudited" (whatever that means) and they are "not required to report" (they are) then I hope no one from the DOT is reading your posts and that's speculation on your part.

It's true that Virgin tends to put out their quarterly information much later than the other airlines and the data is old. However, the June 30th "snapshot" provided by their press release is pretty straightforward. In 6 months, they have burned through about half of their unrestricted cash as reported on their 2011 annual report and their latest quarterly filing. They also have a significant net loss for both the quarter and the first 6 months of their calendar year.

Obviously the day after the press release is submitted things change, but if you're implying that a 100M net loss for the 1st 6 months of the year is going to be reversed in the last 6 months of this calendar year .......well .......sure- anything's possible.

People Express is now United Continental. PE Flight Ops Management is running the place (Fred Abbott). Do some research. No dog in the hunt, just felt compelled.

Ok, VX isnt trying to run anyone out of business and they do have a nice onboard product. So why arent they making any money?

And dont try to argue that UAL is beating up VX so badly that they cant survive. Look at NK and their success, despite all the legacy competition.