Southwest Airlines outlines a “different story” - to add routes and aircraft
27 Jun 2008
Southwest Airlines (SWA) has announced a new schedule, effective 2 November 2008, that will see the legendary carrier add a net nine round-trip flights to its network. With CEO Gary Kelly claiming that the company had a "much different story to tell today than our competitors," the carrier said that it would trim unproductive flights, even as it sought to grow on different routes.
The new schedule will see the LCC add a total of 40 flights, and eliminate 31, from 2 November this year. Kelly said that the carrier will concentrate on enhancement of its schedule in "key growth cities" like Denver and Fort Lauderdale.
"We are trimming our flight schedule, frequently and continually, of unproductive flights, while we continue to grow in cities like Denver," CEO Gary Kelly said. "We have a much different story to tell today than our competitors. We are well prepared financially."
Contrary to the prevailing winds buffeting the industry these days, the carrier had said last week that it was still looking to grow and may ultimately retain the 10 aircraft it had originally planned to retire this year. The new announcement will see the airline utilise two of these aircraft on new routes. This, in contrast to capacity cuts all around, will see SWA's fleet grow by15 aircraft in 2008.
The carrier, which has thrived on innovative practices that it has introduced over the years, also said that it was now using a unique "schedule optimization model," which allows it to determine which routes to add or cut.
In a posting on its website, the "global optimizer" has been described as a tool that "takes all of our schedule rules and preferences and actually picks the one schedule that scores the absolute highest based on the input parameters we supply." According to the posting, all 800-plus nonstop markets have their "own, unique demand curves" and the algorithm "lets us match our schedule" to that demand.
