Wednesday, March 2, 2011

Fly the Flexible Pricing Skies

Fly The Flexible Pricing Skies

Allegiant Air has sent a letter to the Department of Transportation floating the idea of offering a new strategy for airline pricing. The consumer would pay a base price and based upon the price of fuel at the time of travel, the final price would actually be higher or lower. The consumer would be offered the option of paying the regular fare or the new flexible fare.

Sound innovative? It is not a new idea, the charter industry already uses a similar approach. It is basically a strategy of pushing fuel hedging to the customer thus mitigating risk to the airlines associated with world events and the price of fuel.

Which would you rather buy, a set price ticket or one that may go up or down depending upon world events and fuel prices? What percentage of the buying public is likely to participate? If your company's financial policy is to select the lowest price, might that fit into this strategy?

We'll have to wait and see what the Dept. of Transportation thinks about this old strategy being used in a new way.

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