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The perils of selling air travel like an all-you-can-eat buffet
So yesterday’s post was on Spirit airlines and unbundling of air travel. Today, courtesy of the LA Times, we have a story of what happens when airlines let customers buy a bundle (The frequent fliers...
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Commoditizing airlines
We’ve been on a run of airline stories recently so we might as well mention two more. The first is from the Wall Street Journal, noting that Spirit Airlines has risen to being the most profitable...
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Airlines: Where does all the money go?
The Wall Street Journal remains a reliable source of eye candy, to wit: The article in question (How Airlines Spend Your Airfare, Jun 6) attempts to map to what fraction of costs are covered by what...
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Will my flight be on time?
Shortly after this post is published, I will be heading to O’Hare to fly to a conference in New York. Will my flight be on time? That is actually a slightly ambiguous question. The airlines have some...
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Creepy developments in airline travel
So what are reasonable steps a firm may take to personalize its service offering? Clearly some on-line businesses record every link a customer clicks and serves up information based on those choices —...
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A discount airline starts assigning seats
EasyJet, a British discount airline, has long emulated US-based Southwest and let boarding passengers just grab whatever open seat suited their fancy. Now, however, they are introducing assigned...
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Would you bet on jet fuel prices to save on the cost of a plane ticket?
Would you be willing to gamble on the price of your vacation? Specifically, would you buy an airline ticket now — paying some cash upfront — but not know the final price of the ticket until you...
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Overbooking MBAs
Overbooking is a basic model in yield management and is always a fun example to do in class. If you are selling tickets to a flight and there is some chance that passengers will be no shows, it is...
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Good news for better air travelers: More on-time flights
For those heading to an airport for the Thanksgiving holiday, the New York Times (Airlines’ On-Time Performance Rises, Nov 21) has some good news: More flights are leaving on time! There are, of...
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Upgrade auctions
Getting moved from coach to the front of the plane is one of the nicer things that can happen on a long flight. If you a lot (especially on full fare tickets), getting upgraded can be a routine...
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Letting those without carry ons board first
Just how to best get passengers on a plane is an endlessly fascinating topic. It involves everything from physics (e.g., how many people can fit in an aisle at once) to marketing (e.g., how can the...
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What price Wi-Fi?
When I was in grad school in the early 90s, it was a big deal when the business school installed a mess of new pay phones — directly addressing a bottleneck that frustrated MBA students trying to...
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Long, long customs lines
It’s been a while since we have written about long delays to clear immigration control at airports. But as this eye candy from the Wall Street Journal makes clear, it is time to revisit the topic (The...
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Should airlines show you all available seats on a flight?
Check out these two images from the Wall Street Journal (Airline Seats Available for Elite Fliers Only, July 12). Both show available seats on an American Airline flight from LA to New York. The first...
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Loading planes faster
Getting people on and off planes is a fascinating topic. Most people have a very visceral response to it if only because it is a business process that we are routinely exposed that often does not run...
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Service ist Katastrophe!
Slate had a very interesting article about Air Berlin flight that did not go quite as plan for either the passengers or the airline (I’m Here for Business Meetings with No Clothes, Sep 4). The problem...
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Airline fuel use and operations strategy
Jan has been on a data kick lately (see here, here and, oh yeah, here) so here is a picture he might like: It comes from a report by the International Council on Clean Transport entitled “U.S. domestic...
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In theory, a better way to load a plane
How to get passengers onto planes has been a recurring topic on this blog. It is one of the few topics (possibly the only one) we have covered as much as MythBusters has. Now we get a claim that a...
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An airline that doesn’t overbook
One of the most basic tools in yield management is overbooking. For any service provider, capacity is perishable. Having an airline seat, restaurant table, or doctor sit idle is expensive so if you...
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Why do more passengers complain about United than Southwest even when the...
Check out this graphic that combines how Southwest and United Airlines do in handling (more specifically, losing) passenger bags (the lines) with how those passengers complain to the Feds about those...
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