A few insights from a former Southwest devotee:
I, like many other young professionals, am disappointed with Southwest's new selection of fares. I am not interested in "business class" perks and wastefulness and have always flown Southwest to avoid it. I have enjoyed the super low fares and am disappointed to see them jumping up so high in 2008. I will start to take my business, which is considerable, elsewhere instead of paying the much higher prices and dealing with special treatment of certain "business" passengers.
Also, I was happy when Southwest moved the families pre-boarding to in between the A and B groups since I often fly from Orlando and know how out of control pre-boarding can be. But to learn that instead of boarding behind families with children, I will now board behind spoiled businessmen? Yeah, no thanks.
The message I'm getting at is: don't change your positioning. Continue to target the younger, tech-savvy, frequent flying crowd rather than the cranky business stiffs. Because let's face it, the business stiffs have lots of choices with more attractive perks. And you're losing the customers who got you where you are today - the young professionals - with all this fluff and price hiking.
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