When Delta first announced plans to completely remake its regional fleet, I figured it would take a fair amount of time for it to happen. After all, the airline needed to get rid of more than 200 airplanes while adding about 150 more. Boy, was I wrong. It’s just about done.

I put together a graphic showing what’s happening. This compares where we were at the end of the first quarter 2012 versus where we will be when it’s all done in the next couple years.

Remember, while the plan is in place, this isn’t actually happening overnight. It will take a couple years. Still, the plan is now set, so let’s talk about it.

The 50-Seaters
As you can see, the 50-seat category is the one taking the biggest beating. Comair was shut down so its 30 CRJ-200s are being retired. Pinnacle is in bankruptcy, and Delta has decided that all 140 of the CRJ-200s that it’s operating will go away as well. Meanwhile, SkyWest (including subsidiary ExpressJet) has agreed to cut 66 of its CRJ-200s out.

That leaves 90 of the airplanes with SkyWest. Republic-owned Chautauqua, meanwhile, was at 24 ERJ-145s but has agreed to operate 7 more at least for the next year. So at most, there are a mere 121 50-seaters under contract. That’s incredible, and it’s lower than the 125 that Delta had as its hard ceiling.

The 70-Seaters
The number of 70-seat aircraft in the Delta Connection fleet hasn’t changed but the operators have. When Comair was shut down, 5 of its CRJ-700s were given to SkyWest while 10 were given to GoJet. Meanwhile, GoJet had finished picking up 6 more from SkyWest to get to its steady 22 airplanes along with 6 at sister-airline Compass. That left SkyWest with 60 of the airplanes. Republic-owned Shuttle America rounds out the fleet with 14 EMB-170s. That’s a total of 102.

The 76-Seaters
In the 76-seat range, there are growth plans, but there is also some shifting. Comair’s 13 airplanes plus 16 from Pinnacle were given to SkyWest, most likely to give SkyWest incentive to go ahead and ditch those 66 50-seaters. Meanwhile, Shuttle America stayed steady with 16 EMB-175s while Compass had 36.

Pinnacle saw the greatest change. After losing 16 airplanes to SkyWest, Pinnacle had 41 CRJ-900s in its fleet. Delta has now decided to give an additional 40 CRJ-900s to Pinnacle as part of its growth plan. Pinnacle will now solely be a CRJ-900 operator with 81 total.

That leaves Delta with 193 airplanes in this category, but it has the right to go up to 223 after it adds its last 717 to the mainline fleet. So who will get the last 30? Well, along with that order for 40 CRJ-900s, Delta secured 30 options. I assume that at some point those will be exercised and assigned to one of the remaining four regionals – SkyWest/ExpressJet, Shuttle America, Pinnacle, or GoJet/Compass.

The 110-Seaters
Lastly, we have the new 110-seat category. It was Delta’s deal to buy 88 of these airplanes from Southwest that triggered all these other shifts. Those will start coming in next year and deliveries will take a couple of years. Delta had no airplanes in this category before, but now it will operate 88.

What Does This Mean?
When this is all said and done, things will look much better for travelers. The 50-seaters are small and cramped, and lack amenities that even the slightly bigger aircraft will have. For example, the 50-seaters are all coach. The 70+ seat aircraft will have coach, Economy Comfort (more legroom), and First Class. Oh, and they’ll all have wifi too.

That doesn’t mean there isn’t a place for the 50-seaters. Some communities and routes are going to need airplanes that size, but it’s not nearly as many as airlines originally thought. Most airlines would rather go bigger, and Delta has done that by ordering more CRJ-900s for its regionals.

Now I’ll admit that from a passenger perspective, I was bummed to see Delta grow with CRJ-900s. The Embraer 175s have wider and more comfortable cabins. But I have no doubt that Delta got a screaming deal on those airplanes and money talks.

Personally, I’m most excited about the addition of the 717s. That’s partially because they were built in my backyard here in Long Beach, but I actually do like flying on those airplanes. I certainly like them a LOT more than regional jets.

What’s really interesting is that this change isn’t just impacting Delta. United’s pilots agreed to a very similar deal which will see United remake its fleet as well. And while American is a bit in flux still, it’s expected that we’ll see a similar type of deal no matter whether there’s a merger or not.

The downside is, of course, that with fewer small airplanes, small cities will take a hit. If they’re lucky, they’ll have fewer flights but on bigger airplanes. If they aren’t, they’ll lose a lot of service. We’ll have to see how this all shakes out.

But overall, this is a good thing for travelers. And the speed with which is all shook out is pretty amazing.

I’m still out on leave, but I’ll be back soon. Enjoy this post about small communities . . .

–

Over 70% of US airports with commercial air service are served exclusively by regional airlines. And almost all of those airports reside in or next to small or midsize communities. Unfortunately, both the communities and regional airlines face head winds in the coming years. New regulations coupled with the potential for additional taxes and reductions in subsidies will hamper the regionals’ ability to grow and operate with sustained profitability. This will have a direct effect on the small communities that regional airlines serve.

Most people have never heard of Pinnacle Airlines, ExpressJet Airlines, or Republic Airlines but have flown on them many times. An average regional airline flies turboprop aircraft or jet aircraft with less than 100 seats on a contract basis for mainline carriers such as United or Delta. Although separate companies, the regionals usually fly under the mainline’s brand such as Delta Connection or United Express. In most cases, Delta and United take care of scheduling, promoting, and selling tickets for the flights while the regional takes care of providing the primary product. Now, let’s hop into some of the issues.

One of the bigger impacts to the industry will be felt when new rules regulating pilot duty time kick in. (Cranky did a good job of breaking down this issue in a previous post.) These new rules were introduced to address ongoing concerns about pilot fatigue. Pilots will now work a little less and get more rest. This makes sense. Who doesn’t want a well-rested pilot at the controls?

But there is a flip side. The new rules governing duty and rest periods will force carriers to hire more pilots if they want to run the same schedules they have today. The savvy regionals will work diligently with their mainline partners to reoptimize schedules. But they will not be able to totally avoid higher pilot costs. Regionals will have to pass on the additional costs to their mainline customers to remain at current profitability levels.

Another new upcoming regulation will increase the minimum number of hours of experience a pilot needs to fly for an airline. Currently, a pilot only needs 250 hours along with a Commercial License to get hired with a regional airline. In a couple of years, this will increase to 1,500 hours and require an Airline Transport Pilot (ATP) certificate.

On the surface, this seems like a no brainer. More hours = more experience = safer flying. But there isn’t research proving that pilots with 1,500 hours consistently fly safer than someone with less experience. When this steep increase is implemented, it will create an artificial pilot shortage. Some pilots pay out of pocket or through loans to get to 250 hours. Getting to 1,500 hours on one’s own dime will push a bunch of would-be pilots out of the market. The shortage will push up wages to account for the lower supply and result in additional expenses.

In the fall of 2011, the Obama administration proposed creating a new $100 departure tax for all air carrier departures and general aviation jet departures. The proposal also increased security taxes on airline tickets and was given to the super committee for consideration. An impressive coalition of 30 organizations including airline trade groups, general aviation groups, unions, and manufacturers quickly got together to fight the proposal. The rally cry is that airlines and passengers already pay higher taxes than alcohol, tobacco and guns which are intentionally set high to discourage their use.

It appears that the White House quietly backed off the proposal because of the backlash it received during an election cycle. If the proposal was revisited and passed, it would have a disproportionate effect on regional airlines that carry fewer passengers each flight than their mainline counterparts. It’s much cheaper to spread $100 over 200 passengers than over 50.

Another debate in Congress has been the over subsidizing air service to small communities through the Essential Air Service (EAS) program. This program is designed to help provide small communities with air service that cannot, due to such low demand, support itself. I expect a haircut or possibly elimination of this program. Accordingly, many routes would cease to exist.

In isolation, each of these challenges would have a much smaller impact on the industry. Together, these policies would have significant negative economic effects and force airlines to cut flights on underperforming routes. And each flight lost in a small community has larger implications due to the community’s relative size.

These changes will burden an industry already struggling with consolidation and high fuel prices. Pinnacle is flirting with bankruptcy. SkyWest and Republic’s financials have been limping along since their acquisitions of ExpressJet and Frontier respectively. American Eagle’s anticipated spinoff from American Airlines will increase competition in an already saturated market. We’re seeing a steep decline in small jets which don’t work with today’s fuel prices. Turning a good profit in the regional industry is proving difficult even while their mainline counterparts are starting to enjoy being in the black.

Some municipalities and the airlines will come up with creative solutions to mitigate the effects. They will also need to continue lobbying the government to implement policies that have positive economic effects. Regardless, it appears that the end result will be fewer options in small communities.

–
Matt Tregre is an airline enthusiast and has held positions in finance, revenue management, pricing, customer service, and baggage tossing with stints at Southwest, ExpressJet, & Pinnacle. During school, he developed marketing plans for small airports. He now works in revenue strategies for a corporate aviation company and greatly misses having flight benefits.

[Original photo via Wikimedia Commons user Paranomia/CC 3.0]

Today I bring you the third and last installment of my interview with Republic CEO Bryan Bedford. In this piece, we spend a lot of time talking about religion. Why? Well, Bryan has really brought religion into the Republic business in a big way.

For example, the airline’s vision statement begins with “We believe that every employee, regardless of personal beliefs or world-view, has been created in the image and likeness of God.” It’s become even more of a topic with the integration of the Frontier and Midwest teams that didn’t choose to work for a religious company.

So, let’s get on it with. (Click for Part 1, Part 2)

ON PARTNERING AND COMPETING WITH THE LEGACY AIRLINES

Cranky: With some of the bigger airlines, you’re flying for them and you’re competing against them. I mean, you could potentially have a codesharing agreement, then you’re flying for them on a contract and competing against them. It’s a tangled web. Does that cause any tension?
Bryan: I have to break it into the two geographies. Nobody cared about Midwest. The fact that Northwest had an equity stake in Midwest and we codeshared with them. Nobody cared about that. Obviously you know, with Frontier, United was obviously concerned about it. You know, people prefer less competition and not more, but there really wasn’t in our minds, there wasn’t going to be a strategy where Frontier was going to liquidate.

They were making money. Companies that make money in bankruptcy don’t go away. . . . Frontier wasn’t going away. I think that’s the message, whether they wanted to believe it or not. It was going to be around anyway, so hopefully better to have somebody around that’s rational at the controls than somebody who’s irrational.

Cranky: Although, they could have gone away if Southwest bought them. Then there would have been two airlines in Denver.
Bryan: Southwest was free to make an offer and compete, but at the end of the day, they didn’t lose because of insufficient consideration, they had labor issues. I guess in fairness they didn’t lose, they withdrew.

ON RELIGION AND BUSINESS

Cranky: I know you’re busy so just one last question. From a culture perspective, you said morale is high right now, people are pretty excited, you have a single brand. How has the integration been from the perspective of a Frontier employee or Midwest employee? I know you have a very strong culture here in Indianapolis and I know that you’re very religious. Have you seen any tension between Frontier people coming into this and saying “well what’s going on here. What are we getting involved in?”
Bryan: If there is tension out there, it’s pretty low and people are being civil. The Republic vision statement clearly addresses our feelings that we’re all created in the image of god. It calls us to a higher standard of treating people with respect and dignity. In my mind, it calls us to treat people fairly according to the work that they do. It wasn’t to convert people or proselytize. . . . There’s something more here than just a job. We have people of different faiths, different backgrounds, different ethnic cultures. Most airlines are melting posts. It’s just a recognition of who we are and as long as we work together, we’re going to be successful . . . .

Now, we’re not hiding our faith either. We take positions on issues. Abortion was an issue that we took a position on several years ago. It was very controversial, both internally and externally. But again, it’s down to, whether we believe in the sanctity of life or not. It’s not that we were saying that if you get an abortion, you’re fired. That wasn’t the issue. This is a big meaty issue in our culture and our society and people should understand what we think. And oh by the way, if you are in the position of having an unwanted pregnancy, let us know and we can help. And we had employees that did and we did, we arranged a couple of adoptions.

From a Republic perspective, it’s been such a large part of our culture. People who are looking at joining a company and see this either are turned off and don’t apply or they’re turned on and they come here. It’s our culture. Now you’re being bought as Midwest or Frontier and you’re being brought into this culture and clearly there were some folks that were very offended by that. A very, very small number of folks. Look, it’s America. Most of us have a Judeo-Christian world view, so I think we’re more likely to be aligned on this. That was certainly the case with Frontier and Midwest. Now the media talked about is it right or is it wrong? Should CEOs do this, should CEOs do that? It was very controversial according to the press, but that was good too. You know. I mean, at the end of the day, getting people talking about it is healthy.

Cranky: Well, there’s no reason you can’t do it. It’s a company that you can set it up however you want to set up. This isn’t the government.
Bryan: It is true, there’s no law against it. We certainly don’t have a box that you check on your application: “I believe, I don’t believe.” The only qualification to work here is “do good work.” You can believe in the tooth fairy.

Cranky: Wait, that’s not real?
Bryan: It is to my kids

Cranky: I think it’s perfectly fine. People can choose who to fly, who to work for, what they want to do. I just think about it from the perspective of someone who comes in from a high culture company like Frontier, has a really strong good positive culture, not to say that this isn’t positive, and coming into something else that’s a potentially different feel for someone. And removed as well since you’re in Indiana and they’re in Denver. Was there really a tough transition for people?
Bryan: I thought you were just talking from a religious aspect of the culture. Looking at culture in a much more broad sense of the word, prior to the brand announcement being made, there was tension between all cultures. I mean, for the Republic side, “how is owning Midwest and Frontier going to help me in my daily work?” Midwest people I think understood that the company would be gone had we not purchased it, but still trying to figure out, “who are we and what do we do?”

Same for Frontier. “We survived bankruptcy and we survived being taken over by Southwest. What does it mean now?” And so there’s a lot of post-transaction reflection that all three employment groups were doing and it has been a tough transition.

Making the brand announcement has been like a tonic. People can finally say that we know who we’re trying to be. You can make a decision on whether you like it or you don’t like it. If you say, “well, I don’t like the brand proposition with no first class seating.” Ok, well, act accordingly. We hope you stay, but if you don’t, god bless you. And the majority will stay because they love the industry, they love working for Frontier.

ON LABOR INTEGRATION

Bryan: We also have labor integration issues. It’s interesting that non-represented classes of employees, we were able to hire mediators arbitrators to sit down with both sides and within 90 days we’re integrated and everything is cool. People are now able to transfer around within the larger network and it’s working out pretty well. In cases where we have represented workers in different unions, it’s just a lot more conflict. It’s the classic US Airways east-west stuff.

Cranky: Hopefully it’s not to that extent.
Bryan: Well, it’s not. Look, our world view is if you don’t want to integrate the seniority lists, don’t integrate the seniority lists. We’re ok with that. We’re not merging the companies in the classic sense. We’re not merging Frontier into Republic. Yeah, we own it, but it’s the Airbus operator. It’s always going to be the Airbus operator and a CS300 operator, but it’s going to be a separate certificate. So we don’t care.

If merging the senoirity list is creating tension, then don’t do it. So there are answers. We’ll treat everybody the same. I think the whole seniority integration is just a red herring. It’s more union vs. union as opposed to employee vs. employee. We’re all going to sink or swim together. A lot of our Republic capacity is now in the brand operation, so the brand operation better work.

Cranky: I think I’ve probably kept you longer than you had anyway, so thank you.
Bryan: It was good meeting you.

I’m back with part two of my conversation with Bryan Bedford, CEO of Republic (which owns Frontier, among others). In part one, we talked about the strategy that led the company to buy Frontier and Midwest. Today, we get a little more into the weeds with everything from inflight entertainment to competition in Milwaukee and Denver, fees, and more. (Part 3 on religion)

ON INFLIGHT ENTERTAINMENT

Bryan: The LiveTV take rate on sub 2 hour flights is low single digits. People really like it. We tried to get in on the [Embraer] 190s but when we looked at the mission of the 190s, which was thinner, shorter haul markets, we just couldn’t cost justify it. So the next thing was wifi and we’re rolling that out this summer.

Cranky: One of my concerns along those lines is you mix the fleets on routes. I know, out of Long Beach for example, there’s an A318 and an Embraer 190. That’s pretty common. So are you concerned about having the different product?
Bryan: A lot of it comes down to the message. There will be people on the Airbus who want wifi but we’re not planning on that this year. We’re going to see how it does on the E-Jets. So the brand promise is some form of inflight entertainment. Not necessarily LiveTV or wifi but some form will be available on the fleet.

Cranky: 70 seats and up
Bryan: Yeah. There is a connectivity option for wifi for small jets. The small jet brand will be differentiated whether it’s Lynx or Connect. There will be some marketing differentiation so people understand. It’ll be very clear when you’re on an E-Jet flight, this is what you’ll get. The only difference will be LiveTV on the Airbus and wifi on the E-jet. There’s a lot of value in the Ejet, but what it really does is that in a place like Milwaukee, 100 seaters are just too many seats for some of these long, thin markets and 137 seats is WAY too much. [laughs]

ON HUB COMPETITION

Cranky: Looking at the route network as it stands today, you have your two main hubs in the two most competitive cities in the country right now.
Bryan: Yeah, well, we didn’t start that fight.

Cranky: I think others expected you not to be around at this point, so that’s why this fight is going on. What are you seeing right now? Are you at a place where things are going well? Do you see a place where all these airlines can exist at their current levels?
Bryan: Well, first I would say that we were disappointed by our Q1 revenue results. How much of that would be brand confusion, our poor execution on managing technology systems, codeshare process . . . . We learned a lot of hard questions in Q1, took a lot of chances in Q1. We learned another hard lesson that it’s a competitive marketplace and if we aren’t prepared to compete on price, we aren’t going to get the business. We’ve absorbed all those lessons and we’ve hit the cover off the ball in March. We’ve hit the cover off the ball in April. Advance booking numbers into the summer are off the charts. So, it feels really good right now, actually.

We’re less interested today in what the competition is doing. We’re really just into what we’re doing. We’re running a really good airline – 99.9% completion factor, 87% on time rates so we’re putting out a great product in the second quarter and in the first quarter as well but we all suffered from weather events. I think you stay the course right now.

We still have a lot of integration work to do. The brand decision was hard for us to make and it was hard for Midwest, but it was also liberating because now it allows the commercial people to really focus on this is the brand. This is the brand promise. We don’t have to worry about messaging in different ways. That’s good for the employees. We now know that we are one and we are delivering this product. We’ve just gotta execute and the competition will take care of itself.

I do not see the competition exiting Milwaukee. We’re taking traffic from northern Illinois, and we’re paying a pretty price for it. Unfortunately, the discounted pricepoint is something like $60 off to get people to go up to Milwaukee. When they get there, they have a great experience. It’s just a smaller, better ease of use airport that’s more reliable.

It’s taken a lot of discounting to get people to come up there to try us but we hope once they try us, they’ll come back.

Cranky: This sort of goes back to what you were talking about before about people buying on price. What can you do to get people to buy on product or on service?
Bryan: If that’s what I said, I wasn’t clear. I think price is clearly #1, #2 is product.

Maybe it’s the win or tie strategy. As long as we’re price competitive, we believe that we can beat the other guys. We don’t believe our brand is strong enough today, I hate to say it, but the facts are the facts, to get a price premium.

ON WEB BOOKING AND DISTRIBUTION

Cranky: Is there anything in the way people buy that can change to help that?
Bryan: Certainly the other LCCs do a much better job of driving customres to their website.

There’s a huge gap in terms of distribution on our own, whether its via the call center or the IBE [internet booking engine], but that’s an opportunity for us to start selling products in ways where you’re going to find the best deals on frontier.com, we’re going to bundle some things that you can buy online.

Cranky: And that’s already there to some extent. I know for our flight home, we bought the Classic product. It shows it to you, but if someone books through a travel agent or online agent, they’re not even going to see if it’s an option.
Bryan: That’s true. We have a workaround on that but we’ve debated whether we want to roll it out or do we want to make Classic fares available on the GDS. It’s a debate that happens internally, but there is one side of the market that would drive us to make it available.

For example, all of our corporate accounts work through a corporate travel agent. [Classic Plus] is a product that they want. They want refundability, flexibility. They want one way pricing. They want seat assignments. They want free bags. That Classic [Plus] product is what they want, and the only way they can buy is through the GDS. We do have to make that product available to that segment of the market.

Cranky: It’s not today?
Bryan: No, not today. It should be by the summer. . . . Then do we take it out even further? Do we roll it out to all the GDS? But put distribution aside for a second.

ON FEES

Bryan: What we’re really trying to do is give customers choice. A lot of people talk about, “don’t charge me bag fees.” We’ll give you that option. We’ll give you the option to buy a la carte or to buy a bundle. You’re in control. If you really are offended by those fees, then by all means, we want you to buy the bundled product. We obviously want people to buy that.

It’s interesting. On our website we’re getting less than 40% of our sales there. But of that 40% that’s buying, almost 40% of those are buying the bundled product. So the take rate’s pretty high.

Cranky: It’s a huge revenue opportunity.
Bryan: Yeah, I think so. And certainly rolling that out to the Midwest network will help as well. There are lots of opportunities to gain share.

ON CODESHARING

Cranky: Is this something, ya know, you see people interested in codesharing like JetBlue going to SABRE to open up that opportunity. Is that something you’re interested in?
Bryan: Well, we’re SABRE-hosted.

Cranky: But are you looking to pursue codeshares?
Bryan: Well, of course we’re interested. You were in Phoenix so you heard the whole collaboration speech that was given. Just looking at companies that cover huge regions of geography that we don’t touch and the reverse is true. Looking at how we could expand the network. There were discussions pre-bankruptcy with Frontier but of course it takes a lot of time and energy.

I’ll have the final chapter in the next couple of days.

Last week, I had the chance to sit down with Bryan Bedford, CEO of Republic, in the carrier’s northwest Indianapolis headquarters. (It’s that building on the right, in the shadow of the odd-looking pyramid buildings.) You may not know the name Republic, but you know some of its brands: Frontier, Midwest, Chautauqua, Shuttle America, and Republic Airlines.

Our hour-long conversation was just downright fascinating covering topics from religion, to integration with Frontier and Midwest, along with bundling vs a la carte pricing and more. When we first sat down, Bryan immediately asked about me. We spent nearly ten minutes on my background before getting into the airline talk, which is where we begin today. I’ve broken this across the aisle interview down into three parts. Today, we start with the airline’s recent expansion and go into the strategy and now-discontinued multiple brand strategy. (Part 2 on competition and fees, Part 3 on religion)

ON THE RESULTS OF FRONTIER’S RECENT EXPANSION

Bryan: Where are you living now?
Cranky: Long Beach, actually, and I’m flying you back on Monday.
Bryan: Thank you.
Cranky: Gotta make sure we keep you there.
Bryan: Of all the new markets that we’ve opened that’s the one that’s really struggling. We’re trying some targeted advertising in Denver, because a lot of folks in Denver don’t know where Long Beach is. We’re trying to figure out how to get people to understand that it’s the Southern California alternative.

We’re opening 15 new markets and that is the only one that’s not hitting its revenue forecast. Some are just barely making it, like Santa Barbara is just, but some, like Branson, what a shocker.

Cranky: I was gonna say, you’ve already added capacity there.
Bryan: It’s blowing the doors off. The only reason we went there was because we had a really high revenue guarantee.
Cranky: I guess you won’t need the revenue guarantee right now.
Bryan: No, it’s going to be very profitable.

ON THE INITIAL REASON FOR BUYING FRONTIER AND MIDWEST

Cranky: So the strategy seems to be now more find the right markets for the Embraers.
Bryan: Step back a bit and look at a higher level. We’ve had great growth, great expansion through 2008. Then the fuel shock happened and we learned a couple of things. One, airlines are very jaundiced about adding capacity, and two, consolidation is on everybody’s mind and a lot of people’s lips. . . . Quite frankly it’s happened slower than I would have thought. I think the first go around with Continental and United should have been done . . . when United’s market cap was $600 million instead of $3.6 billion.

As the operator, consolidation is good since it makes your partners stronger . . . but the fact is that when they combine, if 70% of their passengers are flow, they can flow them through anywhere they want. So they can operate larger capacity planes by funneling more flow over a specific hub. Dehubbing becomes a very serious option.

Cranky: Shrinking pie for regionals
Bryan: Shrinking pie for regionals and certainly shrinking pie for smaller regional jets. We have to acknowledge there’s just not a lot of growth opportunities. There’s the opportunity for market share to move around, but having alternatives is healthy. We never wanted to be so big with one airline so that the loss of that partner would be an extinction model for us. But now, the fact that our core business is at risk for virtually no growth if not contraction, if there’s one area that can benefit from the capacity reduction and consolidation, it’s the LCC side.

ON REGIONAL CONSOLIDATION

Cranky: Do you expect consolidation on the regional side?
Bryan: There’s a lot more discussion about it. The Wall Street analysts love transactions, you know? It’s hard to consolidate because most of the contracts that we all have have change in control provisions that in some cases allow partners to cancel deals or at least renegotiate deals.

Cranky: Could be something like a Mesa in bankruptcy?
Bryan: I won’t say that it’s impossible. Nothing is impossible. I won’t even say it’s implausible, because when there’s a will there’s a way. . . . We’re all looking for the same thing. Where can you take out non value-add expenses to become more cost effective. I just think it’s hard because the seller is not necessarily controlling the revenue stream.

ON THE NOW DISCONTINUED MULTIPLE BRAND STRATEGY

Cranky: So now you’re in the [low cost carrier] LCC space. You started bringing Midwest and Frontier together. The question I asked you in Phoenix is “are you regretting it yet?”
Bryan: [Laughs]
Cranky: It’s been an interesting road. I’m particularly curious. It seems like at the beginning you had this plan to operate multiple brands, get the operational efficiency of running them behind the scenes. Clearly there’s been a change to go toward the Frontier brand after a few months of this. So what have you seen? Is the multiple brand thing something that just doesn’t work for a single airline?
Bryan: When we started looking at the possibilities of these acquisitions, we went outside the airline industry. Avis and Budget was a good example of the model where, here’s a company that’s in the rental car business where they have the premium Avis brand and the discount is Budget. And they seem to coexist well. And that was really sort of the example of a model where we were going to go after.

Cranky: Where Midwest would be the premium brand and Frontier . . .
Bryan: . . . the discount brand, yeah. We learned quickly. The education that we got was in 2009 we bought these brands at the trough of the recession and there was no demand for premium anything. So the Midwest response, even before we bought them was to make less premium available . . . so there was a lot of experimentation out of desperation to try and figure out a model that would allow that airline to work. Everything was working against them.

Cranky: Especially in Milwaukee
Bryan: Yeah, so we did start the customer research process not necessarily to pick one brand or not but just to measure brand health and try to figure out what resonated with customers. What we discovered was the Milwaukee community wanted the same thing as everyone else. They wanted affordable fares, nonstop service. In their own ways, each one of these airlines are trying to provide that.

A lot of what we learned is the Midwest brand had this perception of what it was back then. Customers would revisit the airline and there would always be disappointment. “That’s not what I remember Midwest to be.” And they were right, it wasn’t.

Cranky: They were lobster and fine china back in the ’90s.
Bryan: The Milwaukee community loved it but as soon as the economy soured, budgets went from buy first to buy coach. But sorry, you can’t buy that on Midwest. After all the struggles they went through, they still enjoy lots of hometown customer support. That underdog role that they took on with AirTran, people wanted them to succeed. But they really weren’t fulfilling the need of the customer at the end of the day. Shrinking service from the west coast, abandoning the west coast. Huge, huge mistake. Then again, the MD80s burned so much gas and the 717s couldn’t make it to the west coast. They had few choices and they were all bad.

Cranky: And now you have Frontier. Have you seen the acceptance levels, is there anything different now that Midwest is gone from Milwaukee?
Bryan: Interestingly enough, one, Frontier actually has great customer service. The inflight experience is actually very complementary. Having TV on the airplane is a new amenity for folks in Milwaukee and they really like it. We thought there was a need to try to bridge between what was Frontier and what was Midwest and the answer to that is Stretch [extra legroom seating].

I’ll post the rest of the interview over the next week or so.