Alaska Airlines: We Still Run SEA..
As DL has started to grow in SEA, Alaska has made a strategic choice to ramp up its own growth in order to ensure that it continues to offer by far the best domestic network in Seattle. By doing so, it hopes to remain the preferred carrier for Seattle-based business travelers.
- Adding 27 new daily departures from Seattle by the spring of 2015. Alaska has already added nonstops to five new cities from Seattle: MSY, TPA, BWI, DTW, and ABQ; and it will begin nonstop flights to CUN next month. The rest of the increase will consist of extra frequencies on key routes to cities including BOS, ORD, DEN, LAX, and PDX."
- Swapping out a 737-400 in favor of a 737-900ER essentially allows Alaska Air to boost its seating capacity by more than 25% at no additional cost. Naturally, this represents a nice margin tailwind.
-It will also make Alaska a more formidable competitor in Seattle going forward. By the end of 2017, virtually the entire Alaska Air fleet will consist of state-of-the-art Boeing 737-800s and Boeing 737-900ERs. These are some of the most cost-efficient planes available today.
