America West Airlines Essays - Airline Tickets, OpenTravel Alliance

America West Airlines America West Airlines has influenced their customers' buyer behavior with a not so pleasant track record. The airline industry is a service that satisfies customer needs for traveling. Whether for business or leisure the airline industry is an increasingly growing business. If companies are not able to compete with their rivals in an already overly competitive market, then they will not benefit financially. The market segments that we will be discussing are the business traveler and the vacation traveler. The benefits between the markets are similar between the two segments. I will discuss some recommendations that could benefit the company. Most importantly, delivering the view of the consumer and what a consumer should expect from an airline. Determining a result depends on these components. This paper will discuss some of these problems and resolutions. The airline industry started out as a luxury item. Business travel has changed this industry to a necessity. As we become a global economy and communication between international companies is a key tool, travel has increased dramatically. The vacation traveler has always had the need for the airline industry. Satisfying the customer needs today involves competitive rates along with convenience of booking flights and benefits with those flights. America West Airlines has not able to provide a quality service lately. The business travelers need competitive rates for travel. The marketing mix for business people consists of the actual flights, pricing, where and how it is promoted, and finally its distribution. America West has low-fares marketed to meet the business and travelers' needs. This full-service airline is a coast-to-coast route system and includes most major destinations across the US, with additional destinations in Mexico and Canada. America West utilizes its Phoenix and Las Vegas connections as gateways for travel throughout its destinations. America West has a code-sharing agreement with Continental, which was the first extensive alliance of its kind between two carriers. The company also has a code-sharing agreement with Mesa Airlines and Air Midwest. Some of the marketing strategy involves sponsorship with sports teams. Between these different affiliations, America West uses this in part for distribution and marketing. Some of the problems with this industry are personally experienced. The airline has a difficult time being punctual. This is lately a norm in the industry, although, it is avoided by other companies. The airline industry historically fluctuates in response to general economic conditions that are present. The airline industry is sensitive to changes in economic conditions that affect business and leisure travel. The industry is highly susceptible to situations that result in declines in air travel, such as political instability, regional hostilities, recession, fuel price escalation, inflation, adverse weather conditions, consumer preferences, labor instability or regulatory oversight. The Company's results of operations for interim periods are not necessarily indicative of those for the entire year, because the travel business is subject to seasonal fluctuations. Due to the greater demand for business and leisure travel during the summer months, revenues in the airline industry for b usiness and leisure travel in the second and third quarters is typically greater than revenues in the first and fourth quarters of the year. This has an overall impact on the industry. The next phase is making recommendations for the company. The recommendation is to gain the customer's confidence back by informing them of the changes made with their timeliness. The general experience with the company has been rescheduled departures and delays, which attributes to their failure. They have also had some maintenance issues they need to be addressed. Customers for the business travel market segment need to have reliability, punctual flights, ease of booking flights, and frequent flyer miles for needs of traveling. The needs of the market segment for leisure travel consists of all of the business segment and the company could do promos for flying to certain destinations that the airlines receives great deals on. If the company can provide the benefits and satisfactions associated with good business practice, the consumers resolve their traveling requirements with America West Airlines. The company could use a marketing strategy that would involve informing the customer how they gave the company a facelift. The company could address the fact that they have had punctual issues and resolved the