Why does southwest airlines exist?

What are these new things to help with peanut allergies? I am curious as it would be nice to know how not to die because fatty needs his snacks.

If there’s one thing we learned from Covid, it’s that people can’t be inconvenienced caring about other people.

I think Southwest is ok. The one thing I do not like is the lack of assigned seating. It requires people to be at the gate early when I could be doing something else (like drinking). At times it is the cheapest option but not like it once was.

Also the "bags fly free" is a good gimmick

OP goes home devastated. Never came back to defend his position. But he still wins because the thread is still going.

Let's not forget the idiotic boarding system.

I dunno ... I'm no fan of Southwest but I just booked a RT for my wife and I from San Jose to Phoenix, non stop, midweek Jan, for $105 each. That's a win. Can't wait to do some running and hiking in the sun.

What defense do you want? Southwest is more expensive than the other airlines to anywhere I could go from Boston. It was more expensive when I lived in California too.

Seems like people like the customer service and points. That's great. I always get lousy service with American and Delta. Alaska and Jet Blue have been pretty good. I haven't flown spirit but I've heard they have crazy numbers of cancellations.

the other costs associated with travel like hotels are expensive enough as is. I'm not going to spend the extra $50-100 to fly southwest even if their customer service is pretty good. No one has convinced me its worth it.

I'm not sure if you're doing the proper evaluation of costs here. I just did a comparison between SWA and other airlines for a nonstop 12/26-28 round trip between Logan and Chicago Midway/Ohare - the SWA fare was $316.80 (which includes two free bags). The cheapest fare otherwise is a United flight for $386, which doesn't include free bags unless you sign up for a credit card (coincidentally, I have one of these since I fly United internationally a lot).

If you're in a market that SWA has good flights in/out of (sadly, not Portland), you will almost always do best using them vs other airlines besides the garbage low-cost carriers like Spirit (who screw you so badly with fees that you end up paying close to the same for a horrendous experience). Is it luxury? No, but neither is United or any other major carrier's Economy class. Plus, you always end up on a 737 vs possibly getting stuck on a CRJ or Embraer on other airlines.

If you save the extra $70+ that I just showed you on a BOS-CHI RT by using SWA, you can upgrade to a nicer hotel room or eat an extra appetizer at Alinea (j/k that place is prix fixe only).

The cost of a ticket involves several factors including how many airlines serve a city. The more airlines that serve a city, the more competitive the fares.

I fly out of Colorado Springs or Denver a good bit. Southwest is rarely the most expensive, but often not that much cheaper when I look. I see cheap fares from time to time on it and have gotten some really good deals like San Diego in October for about $99 each way.

As I noted I prefer having an assigned seat to allow for a little more flexibility in boarding times. It can be inconvenient to have to check in 24 hours ahead to make sure I get a low enough boarding spot (and I am too cheap to pay the extra to get it).

A couple of friends have flown Spirit. Not sure a ticket would be cheap enough to go through some of the hassles they experienced not to mention the additional costs for every little thing.

Check it out at UCLA and Dr. Nel and his research . Oh , I am so fat , not. When looking for a snack I think you will find peanuts very nutritional compared to the crap you're stuffing yourself with and eating.

When I lived in California, I used to use Southwest a lot, and often it was the cheapest choice. They did a good job of appealing to the riff raff (I was riff raff then) by just letting people sit where they wanted to, and they also did a smart thing by only having one type of plane that they flew (Boeing 737) and still only fly. For a while, I guess they had a few 727s, but it's really only been the 737s. It's not the same airline that it was.

Southwest is actually the cheapest for routes I fly. plus I can usually get a discount buying a gift card at Costco making the flight even cheaper. and they make it easy if you cancel a flight.

I haven't flown much in years, but I remember pre-9/11 being on a Southwest flight where a guy opened up his briefcase which had numerous cans of Busch beer strapped in the top. America was a different place in the 90s.

Southwest Airlines is California's high speed rail.

Even the members of the Legislature and their staff from Southern California use it to get to and from Sacramento on Mondays and Fridays.

Love Field in downtown Dallas. Basically the only airline there. You can avoid the crowds of DFW.