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Originally Posted by Justanothermember
Same for Montreal. It would be nice to have more year-round connections to the country's second largest city than simply the price-gouging carrier that is AC, who have all but forgotten about YWG anyway. I'm looking for both Porter and WestJet to step up at some point next year to establish this sorely needed connection.
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While YUL-YWG definitely has suffered for inadequate competition, but I don’t think you can blame AC for that - they’re the carrier that has actually served (and been increasing service on) that route. And they are set up to serve business travellers - they have a higher cost structure. When you look at costs 15 to 20 cents per seat mile, and after you adjust for the load factor, the fares look more reasonable.
Reality in the airline industry is that there is a very complicated mix of high and low value fares to fill the plane, and some of those are below fully allocated cost. The public tends to think an $89 ticket costs $89, but the lower end fares are more reflective of competition to fill seats than a measure of true cost. And the super cheap carriers that sell every seat at $89 are probably losing money to get market share, but have also cut some corners to do it. People don’t like to think of being subsidized by others, but it’s almost the definition of airline yield management.
Put another way - I flew home from ATL via YYC. 2600mi for $200. That was a loss for the airline. Previously I flew to Dallas via MSP. For half the distance I paid $1000 each way. That’s a factor of 10 in price paid per seat-mile!