551–560 of 628 posts
Awesome, I hope we see a lot more of this. Co-ops do work, REI is one, Modo is another and we could have many more. Over and over again companies are slowly destroyed by extractive shareholders or PE firms, the current structure of a public company is not the only possible shape.
I like the approach Bob's Red Mill took.
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They don't have to actually sell a single scratchcard for it to be worthwhile for them - the whole point is to cheapen the experience. They have an entire theory of marketing based on people believing that "if it feels cheap, it is cheap", and so they deliberately build in a bunch of annoyances (scratchcards, arbitrary baggage restrictions, checkout hoop-jumping, endless PR about removing toilets or running standing-…
It's kinda refreshing to see a company sell the illusion of bargain bin instead of selling the illusion of luxury like many other companies!
1) Revenue/Route management: re-think the routes with a ruthless focus on sustainable routes with defensible margins.
2) Customer experience and Brand: being an LCC can't come at the expense of customers, i.e., the fare is so cheap we get to treat you like shit.
3) Capital-structure & cost base: you need to right-size the debt, fix liquidity, and ensure you have a durable cost structure (fuel-risk management, etc.)
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A more fair assessment would be: company runs a utility => they need to be a regulated utility! The core part of air travel doesn’t really feel any different to a bus or metro or train. Off the tarmac then yes it absolutely feels like a Verizon store, as does some of the in-flight service, but there’s always been this weird feeling as a traveler that every carrier is basically the same thing but with different decals…
The question is whether we feel air travel is as essential to everyday life as busses and trains are. In other words, do we need to make sure everyone can afford to take a flight somewhere? Or is air travel a luxury that we can allow the market to set a price for? Maybe flights are simply too cheap, and we should just allow airlines to fail, which will limit supply enough to bring ticket prices back up to a level tha…
Anywhere I can get to by train in the USA I can go faster and cheaper by plane. By bus I can go "cheaper" if I ignore the value of my time and the people offering me meth at the bus-stop.
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A more fair assessment would be: company runs a utility => they need to be a regulated utility! The core part of air travel doesn’t really feel any different to a bus or metro or train. Off the tarmac then yes it absolutely feels like a Verizon store, as does some of the in-flight service, but there’s always been this weird feeling as a traveler that every carrier is basically the same thing but with different decals…
The question is whether we feel air travel is as essential to everyday life as busses and trains are. In other words, do we need to make sure everyone can afford to take a flight somewhere? Or is air travel a luxury that we can allow the market to set a price for? Maybe flights are simply too cheap, and we should just allow airlines to fail, which will limit supply enough to bring ticket prices back up to a level tha…
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Ryanair (EU) also does this, but the US is indeed pretty obnoxious here. United even has commercials before the safety video; combined with the "if you're watching explicit content on this flight, please mind the children" announcement, those flights onestly honestly felt pretty surreal to me.
United has gotten worse and worse with this. The ads after (not before) the safety video, and also before each movie you watch (and it's usually the same ads before every movie). A few years ago the ads were skippable, but not anymore. The flight attendant also makes an announcement about the United-branded credit cards near the beginning of the flight. But this is really just an illustration of what the top-poster o…
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> every working citizen could easily afford more expensive airline tickets You mean every laboring slave. No free market means corporations are allowed to engage in slavery, chattel or otherwise. Let's be honest about what a free market actually is. Factory towns, lifetime debt bondage.
Ah yes, thank you for correcting me. That is exactly what I meant.
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I’ve flown Spirit and Frontier several times, and Southwest many times (I know they’re not quite in the same category, especially after their recent changes). I genuinely don’t know what you’re referring to regarding the experience being wildly different. Other than a few quirks about what they do and don’t charge for and how they board and assign seats, I feel like there’s almost no meaningful difference between the…
I feel like you're living in a different universe then. I will literally never fly Spirit (well, neither will anyone else) nor Frontier ever, I loath the experiences I've had on them so much. First, as someone with relatively long thighs, I literally don't fit in their sardine can seats. But more relevant to most people, while things may be OK if everything goes perfectly and nothing is delayed or cancelled, you are…