Today I would like to talk about a legend in airline industry, Southwest Airlines. It is a well know airlines not only in the US, but also all around the world with its huge profits and permanent success being the most profitable airline in the world. At this point, I should add one more thing that Southwest does not mostly fly overseas. Although its flight range is limited by US, it can still be the most profitable airline. Just one question comes into our minds: How do they do that?
Of course, there are many different kinds of answers to this question, but I would like to mention one of the most important for the sake of the airline, the CEO, Gary Kelly. He is the guy who keeps Southwest one of the best airlines in the world with its forecasting, emotional, and comprehensive skills. He started working as an accountant and he never thought that he would have got CEO position one day, but he did. What are the gems that he has in order to keep the company the best one?
Recently, as all of us know, the world has suffered from gas prices, and it was one of the worst periods not only for all different kinds of industries in the world, but also, especially, for airline industry. However, even though many companies' sales have extremely fallen down, Southwest managed to be the best even at that time. The important factor and name was Gary Kelly, the guy who realized what was coming up, petroleum crisis. He made fuel hedging contracts and kept the fuel price much lower than the current rising price and that smartest attempt made the company be able to keep ticket prices low as well in comparison to the other airline companies' prices. I think this strategy brought such a big advantage to the company, and it still is taking advantage of the hedge contract while other companies are still trying to put their budgets together.
Secondly, he has great communicating skills. He tries to know everybody in his company and whenever he takes a ride, he never uses first class. Instead, he always prefers leaving the front seats to the customers, and he travels with his wife at the back side, which is the loudest part on a plane. Moreover, He is a humble guy who can get into communication with all kinds of people either from his staff or from his customers.
There is one more point that I would like to emphasize, and that impresses me a lot about the company. Whenever you get on the plane, you might realize the difference of the treatment to the customers. Once every 3 months, top executives take a position at the check-in desks and help employees. Also, flight attendants are most of the time so energetic and funny. I would like you all to watch this video because it is hilarious and I call it the real spirit of Southwest airlines. :)
The last advantage of the company I would like to add is its plane types. For example, when we look at Delta airlines' planes, we realize that they have all kinds of different planes from a wide range mostly being used for the flights to overseas. However, Southwest has a clear understanding and policy about their planes. "We are trying to be the best airline fliying with the lowest fares, so we have to keep our prices low and the first we can do is to keep our planes in one or two kinds, so we can reduce our maintenance cost and the repair time." Hence, the company has mostly Boeing 737 to apply this smart policy and guys it works so well because Southwest's success mostly comes from its reduced flight costs.
Therefore, we have covered some aspects of the success of the Southwest Airlines. I am attaching a couple links that you can check out if you are interested in.
