Archive for the 'Southwest Airlines' Category
October 08 2007
A Southwest Airlines employee was reprimanded after he asked a passenger to change his t-shirt because he thought it was offensive. A Southwest spokesperson said that the airline did not have a dress code, so the passenger should have been permitted to fly.
Oh, the shirt? It had a drawing of a fisherman on it with the words, "Master Baiter." Ugh. And to think…people used to wear fedoras and suits to fly…
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September 20 2007
For some reason there’s been lots of Southwest news lately:
The airline announced that it will keep its much-loved and much-hated open seating policy after tests showed that customers preferred (huh?) the open seating. They’re tweaking the current system a bit, further subdividing the boarding groups and giving you a specific number in line (ie, you’ll be given A37, and you’ll stand behind A36. 10 points for guessing who you stand in front of. Correct answer: woman with too-short miniskirt who is trying to milk every ounce of publicity she can. Wait, I wasn’t talking about that. I was talking about boarding processes. Sorry.)
The new boarding will be introduced everywhere by early November.
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September 19 2007
After hearing complaints from business travelers who whined about families pre-boarding, grabbing all the best seats before the first boarding group, Southwest Airlines has decided to have families board between groups A and B. This is a strangely family-unfriendly move from an airline that has always treated kids well. I appreciate that business travelers (like myself) have it hard and paid more for tickets and boo hoo. If you’ve ever traveled with kids, you know it sucks and having a bit of extra time on the plane is useful. No mini-skirts? No pre-boarding for kids? Not a great PR week for Southwest…
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September 18 2007
Southwest Airlines sure knows how to capitalize on some bad publicity:
The airline has launched a "mini-skirt sale" poking fun at the recent news that a flight attendant asked a woman wearing a mini skirt (miniskirt? mini-skirt?) to cover herself with a blanket or change clothes. The press release from the carrier says, "The publicity caught us with our pants down, quite frankly. The story has
such great legs, but we have an even better sense of humor, so we’re going to
jump out there and lower our fares to match the mini skirts we’ve all been
hearing so much about…." Har.
The woman whose miniskirt caused this whole thing is reportedly not too happy about it, saying that Southwest is exploiting her as a marketing ploy. Sounds about right.
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September 07 2007
A female passenger was recently asked to leave a Southwest flight prior to takeoff because airline staff considered her skirt to be too short and her top to be too revealing. The woman, who happens to be a Hooters waitress (though that’s neither here nor there), was wearing a short skirt and tanktop on a flight to Tucson (where it was well over 100 degrees) was approached by a customer service agent and told that she had to go home and change because her clothing was inappropriate. She refused and took the flight while covering herself with a blanket. The story is odd because, as it turns out, she really wasn’t wearing anything out of the ordinary.
Southwest said that it reserves the right to deny boarding to someone who is dressed inappropriately, though it’s kinda funny coming from Southwest, as their early advertisements (here and here — on their own website no less!) featured their flight attendants in hot pants and miniskirts. I guess the staff are allowed to dress that way.
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August 06 2007
The Dallas Morning News has an interesting look at the changes Southwest Airlines is considering making over the next 2 years or so. Southwest has (obviously) been held up as a shining example of how to make an airline work in a miserable commercial environment. But over the past 3 years or so, their consumer value has diminished a bit, as other airlines are offering free TV, assigned seating, more legroom, and, likely in the near future, wi-fi, at the same price (or lower) than Southwest. They plan to roll out an assigned seating policy of some sort by the end of the year, they’re testing wi-fi, they may introduce TV, as well as considering other changes.
This hardly suggests that their model is broken, but other airlines offering similar value have surpassed them in nearly measure. As one person in the article said, with JetBlue you get free TV, with Southwest you get a funny boarding announcement.
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June 28 2007
Remember how every article written about Southwest used to be a love (luv?) letter? Not anymore.
The WSJ (sorry, registration req’d) looks at the array of ills facing the airline, not least of which is that many of their competitors have lowered their costs through bankruptcy, leaving the carrier with some of the highest labor costs in the business. Plus, their so-called no frills competitors have added frills, leaving Southwest to look much more like a — GASP! — legacy carrier. (sort of). They also knock the airline for being slow to respond when things started to go bad, though they’ve now announced the end of some of their longer haul flights (costly to run and not necessarily profitable at $99 each way), make some overtures toward adding TV/internet on their flights, and cut back on some of their expansion plans.
But the point does seem to be valid that they were slow to respond to changes in the industry. Their lack of amenities no longer seems cute when AirTran, Frontier and JetBlue all have either seatback TV or satellite radio. Their ATA acquisition probably took their eye off the ball for a bit as well. I’m certain they’ll be fine, but I’ve noticed over the past few days that articles about airlines always claim that no matter what is happening in the industry is killing the airlines. Terrorism? Passengers stay home Oil prices? Fares go up and passengers stay home. Competition? Prices go down. Too many seats? Prices go down. Too few seats? Causes delays. Summer travel boom? Causes delays. Slow periods stink and so do busy periods. Ugh.
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May 17 2007
(thanks to reader IAHPHX, as always…)
The Dallas Morning News has an article that debunks some of the myths about the founding of Southwest Airlines. Specifically, that Herb Kelleher didn’t start the airline after drawing a little route map on a napkin. The article also suggests that Kelleher wasn’t all that into the idea of the airline initially, and that he needed some serious convincing. While this seems like small potatoes, the story is at the heart of the Southwest lore…Just as eBay was not created as a way to sell Pez, so another corporate myth is killed. I’m sorry I’m a buzzkill…
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April 24 2007
During its earnings call last week, Southwest Airlines mentioned that it is soliciting bids for an in-flight wi-fi service. The carrier hopes to have a prototype up and running within 9 months. Crazy to think that a supposedly "no frills" carrier would be the first US airline to offer the service. The move is part of Southwest’s strategy to generate more revenue from ancillary services.
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December 01 2006
(Via View from the Wing):
To promote its new Washington Dulles service, Southwest Airlines is offering 8 free Rapid Rewards credits for signing up and double points for flights in and out of Dulles. What’s that mean to you? Fly 2 round trips and get a free ticket on Southwest. With Chicago flights starting at $44 each way, you can get a free flight for less than $200 of flights. Not too shabby.
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Southwest Employee Tells Passenger to Change T-Shirt