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Let's Buy Spirit Air

letsbuyspiritair.com

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Re: Let's Buy Spirit Air

#581

Post by xattt »

jjmarr wrote: post #507
xattt wrote: post #475

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> flying people places doesn't make enough money Does it not make enough money for viability, or does it not make enough money for sociopath types in C-suites? If it’s the latter, there will never be enough money for them and will keep pushing increasingly absurd customer-milking initiatives.

There's not a single major US airline that is profitable on charging passengers for tickets and flying them to destinations. United is the closest, with only a 0.04¢ loss on every seat mile.[1] the other airlines lose 1-2¢/mile. The jets are a loss leader for credit cards. https://finance.yahoo.com/news/big-airlines-lost-money-flyin... [1] There's two metrics airlines report: Cost per Available Seat Mile and Passenge…

Thank you for the clarification. It’s hard to not be cynical as a passenger with no experience in this environment.

Re: Let's Buy Spirit Air

#582

Post by array_key_first »

fluffyllemon wrote: post #576
dml2135 wrote: post #433

Earlier quoted context omitted.

2% savings on all of your consumer spending isn't insignificant, when compounded over time.

Many studies show that consumers spend more when using credit cards, compared to both cash and debit cards, and it's not obvious to me that the 2% will win out.

In the case of air travel where you're, presumably, going to travel either way, I think it can work out. But it only works out if you travel A LOT. Even a moderate amount of travel means you don't win out with the cost of membership.

Re: Let's Buy Spirit Air

#583

Post by [deleted] »

notepad0x90 wrote: post #240
thehappypm wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Spirit seemed to enjoy making their customers hate them. everyone who liked Spirit had to explain themselves (like you did) because their reputation was awful. It was a trainwreck of a brand.

They did things differently compared to other airlines, so it does warrant an explanation. People pay for the cheapest flight, and expect things like free bag checkin. Other airlines will charge everyone more, even if you had no bags and provide free bag checkin. I've had flights where I only had a small backpack and nothing more, I don't want to the "priced in" fee assuming everyone will check a bag. Spirit gave you…

[deleted]

Re: Let's Buy Spirit Air

#584

Post by notepad0x90 »

Drupon wrote: post #293
notepad0x90 wrote: post #24

I could easily afford any of their competitors but I always picked Spirit airlines. The pricing makes sense, pay more if you need more things. I liked Spirit because it was more akin to riding the bus, I got treated well every time by their staff and the experience was fairly consistent. Other airlines also have cramped sits, what little they did better than Spirit isn't worth the price, and the experience was incons…

>I shop at walmart compared to whole foods and other "better" chains for similar reasons. "great value" as walmart's motto goes, it isn't about the price, it's about the value you get for what you pay for. Spirit was the "great value" airline. Yeah it's not a secret that you can get by in life on the cheap if you have cheap, trashy tastes.

name calling aside, i think you missed my argument. If you think my taste is trashy, by my argument, your taste is also trashy, you're just dumb enough to spend extra money so you feel like you're above others. That's the point of the whole "value" thing, if more money gets you more value, that's great, if not then you're saying paying more for less is less trashy? It's like a person paying for a $15 wine and a $70 wine, the quality in that range isn't all that different, you're acting like you're paying $10k to fly singapore airlines when you're just flying cramped on united just like on spirit, but you're paying more.

And you sort of made another point I had: people like you, and companies who cater to people like you come with all that haughty snobbishness that's just unpleasant and degrades the experience. Good taste has to do with appreciation of value and quality, not polishing of one's ego, or pretending you're superior to others.

Re: Let's Buy Spirit Air

#585

Post by notepad0x90 »

tristor wrote: post #480
notepad0x90 wrote: post #24

I could easily afford any of their competitors but I always picked Spirit airlines. The pricing makes sense, pay more if you need more things. I liked Spirit because it was more akin to riding the bus, I got treated well every time by their staff and the experience was fairly consistent. Other airlines also have cramped sits, what little they did better than Spirit isn't worth the price, and the experience was incons…

> I liked Spirit because it was more akin to riding the bus This is exactly why I would never be caught dead on Spirit. Sartre got it right, "Hell is other people." My issue with Spirit and other budget airlines as a frequent traveler was never about the planes, the staff, or the operations, it was always the other passengers. It's bad enough dealing with people in general in the circumstances we all find ourselves i…

I'm not paying hundreds of dollars for a glorified bus ride. I've had issues with passengers on other airlines too. There is no expectation of me as a passenger behaving a certain way, and therefore the likelihood of being mistreated by passengers or staff a like is low. As you noted, other people pay more thinking "higher class" people fly delta or whatever, and to protect that image and experience I expect mistreatment from staff and other passengers alike on those flights.

I would rather deal with someone putting up their nasty leg on the chair next to me, or listen to a movie with speaker on for the whole flight, than deal with rude flight attendants that won't respond to my needs, or dirty looks from other passengers because I'm wearing something comfortable.

Aside from what I see on social media posts though, I've never seen anything extreme like that flying on spirit in all the years.

Re: Let's Buy Spirit Air

#586

Post by nradov »

pibaker wrote: post #574
boppo1 wrote: post #545

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can't they just raise prices?

People keep asking airlines to raise price for better service and then every time they travel they hop on a price comparison website to find the ticket with the lowest sticker price, punishing companies for actually raising prices.

Delta raised prices, delivered better service, and is more profitable than any other US airline.

Re: Let's Buy Spirit Air

#587

Post by ninkendo »

Rover222 wrote: post #387

Isn’t Elizabeth Warren the one who famously killed the merger a couple years ago that would have saved the company? Warren and Sanders are just reflexively against big businesses.

> that would have saved the company?

Why is this automatically the case?

Here, let me try:

She killed a merger a couple years ago that would have ended up with the shutdown of both companies, now we at least have Jet Blue intact.

Both of our statements are equally speculative.

A more honest prediction: Merging Spirit and JetBlue would have resulted in the combined airline going bankrupt anyway, but it would have been too big to let fail so they would’ve been bailed out. And the taxpayer would be propping up yet more failed companies.

Re: Let's Buy Spirit Air

#588

Post by ivraatiems »

MarchApril wrote: post #516
reddalo wrote: post #301

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ryanair is the best performing budget airline in Europe and they only buy new planes, because it's way cheaper to run them. Less time on land for maintenance = less wasted money.

Used, high quality machinery is always in demand, but I think "used" and "planes" have the ability to subconciously sow some doubts in many people. I personally never heard of any airlines with 100% used planes in their fleets. I definitely would choose an airline with 100% new planes. I guess I'm another victim of marketing.

Do you check whether the plane you're on is new or used, typically? Every major carrier in the US regularly buys and sells their planes. See for example https://www.slashgear.com/1858614/why-united-states-airlines...

It's not the same as buying a new car. The legal requirements for maintenance of commercial aircraft is an order of magnitude more substantial.

Re: Let's Buy Spirit Air

#589

Post by hakfoo »

avarun wrote: post #96
ajkjk wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

sounds like it's not efficient at all? it's barely functional as a business and is only surviving on grifty addons?

This is a textbook case of competition pushing profits down to 0. That's an ideal case scenario. Why would you want to change this?

Because at the end of the day, "profits down to 0" also means things like "reserve capacity down to 0", "safety margins down to 0", and "any aspect of the experience that makes it less miserable than being crammed into the cargo pen down to 0".

A modest regulated profit could result in a healthier industry-- one where the least economic hiccup doesn't cause carriers to shut down with limited notice, where they can afford to not play chicken with hours-of-service laws and maintenance standards, and where people don't get promotions for trying to sell the idea of standing-room tickets.

Re: Let's Buy Spirit Air

#590

Post by xnx »

mr_toad wrote: post #381
gorgoiler wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

Streets, tracks and maybe tarmacs are public utilities, not the vehicles themselves.

This is more accurate, but the case for tarmac is weaker than streets or tracks. The natural monopoly on tarmacs is weaker. It can be a very good think for a metro to have competing airports.
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