Unbundling, Rebundling and Now De-Commoditization

As the new year begins, I’m encouraged that airline industry is truly making changes necessary for long-term survival.  Over the past decade, airlines have engaged in a restructuring period like no other since deregulation – in fact making the kind of meaningful structural changes some thought deregulation itself would bring .

American Airlines’ aggressive posture in restructuring the way airline tickets are distributed is an obvious next step in this process.  In most businesses, low-hanging fruit is found where a middleman is involved, as is the case with the aggregators like Orbitz and Expedia.  For the airlines, this effort has some risks and involves more than just cutting costs.  It is about addressing some of the core issues that plague airline pricing and can be termed the de-commoditization of the very product airlines sell – a seat from A to B.

On November 25, 2009, Swelblog wrote about a presentation that former Air Canada President and CEO Montie Brewer gave at MIT titled:  Five Reasons Why the Airline Industry Will Never Be Profitable.  According to Brewer, one significant reason the industry will fail to earn a profit over a sustainable period is the presence of the Global Distribution Systems (GDS).   Now before our very eyes, American Airlines has taken the leadership to challenge the roles played by the Online Travel Agencies (OTA) and the GDS.

Reason #1 cited by Brewer as to why the industry will never be profitable is that the capacity-lead business model causes “constant overcapacity”.

Since deregulation the airline product has been commoditized.  In the commodity framework, the only way the industry, or an airline, can grow revenue is to grow capacity.   But that model didn’t work for airlines, where Computer Reservations Systems and the GDS’s institutionalized the notion that in order for an airline to grow revenue, it needed to offer more and more capacity even before demand warranted.

The addition of capacity led to low and lower operating costs.  On the margin, revenue exceeded cost.  Uneconomic capacity was being deployed each and every day.  Ultimately, it created an industry too big to be sustainable.  If not for the price of oil, the airline industry would never have shed the level of capacity it did between 2008 - 2010.   

The GDS were a major contributor to the commoditization of the airline product.  Therefore, airlines that distribute directly to the consumer have the best likelihood of differentiating, and more importantly, not commoditizing, their product.  This fact contributed to the trend in which certain airlines did well even as much of the industry suffers. Note the one airline in the US that does distribute directly to the consumer:  Southwest.  And Southwest has differentiated, not commoditized, its product. 

What is a commodity?  According to Miriam Webster, a commodity is a good or service whose wide availability typically leads to smaller profit margins and diminishes the importance of factors (as brand name) other than price.  Commoditization can be defined as the process of prices moving substantially lower because of strong competition. Commoditization happens because too many competitors enter a market when they see the large returns that can be earned on certain products. However, those returns soon disappear as competition drives prices lower.

Each defines the airline industry.  Each defines patterns that today’s industry executives are trying to break.  Just because it was done one way or another yesterday does not mean it is the best way of doing business tomorrow.  Enter the Business Travel Coalition (BTC).  Under the veil of protecting consumers, the BTC is doing nothing more than protecting the interests of the money that keeps the organization in business.  Every time the airline industry makes a strategic or commercial move to improve its profitability, the BTC pushes back because change does not serve its clientele well. 

Which leads us to Brewer’s Reason #5: “Nobody Really Wants It to Be Fixed.”  Brewer makes a powerful case that things are fine the way they are . . . and, for the most part, the airline industry value chain, consumers and the government know it.

When it comes to low fares,  consumers can shop the internet and find some market on sale (and the same will be true tomorrow if American and others are successful). They may even find the price of a ticket today equal to or less in nominal dollars than a fare charged two decades ago.  When adjusted for inflation, it is hard to find any consumer product that is a better bargain than air travel.

Taxes and fees account for nearly $60 - or 20 percent - of the average price of a ticket today.  This compares to $22, or 7 percent, in 1972.  In other words, the government is getting a bigger share of a shrinking pie.  GDS fees go up as the real price of a ticket is in decline.  Anything that the industry can do to address margin degradation in the business should be considered and be done.  And that is precisely what American is doing.

There are few areas that remain on the income statement where costs can be cut.  Distribution happens to be one just as the industry is asking the government to examine whether the tax burden imposed on the airline industry is disproportionate.   As the old saying goes: Two percent here and two percent there on top of taxes and fees that consume 20 percent of the ticket price adds up to real money . . . money the industry cannot afford over the long term.

Perhaps most compelling is that all the players in industry's value chain -- GDSs, OTAs, airline caterers, aircraft lessors, ground handlers, manufacturers, airports, fuelers, travel agents, maintenance repair organizations and freight operations -- don’t want it changed.  That’s because each earn a higher return on invested capital than the airline companies that keep them in business.

BTC members do not want the airlines to take control of their inventory because it is sure to weaken the powerful grip the GDS and OTA have over the industry today.  Ask yourself, would you really want to be in business if you did not have near complete control over your inventory?  I think not.   Do GDS and OTA know your customers better than you do?  I think not.  In short, a commodity is a product that has a low degree of differentiation.  Over the past decade, the product offered by the network carriers and the low cost carriers have converged to where there is little to no differentiation because schedule and price are the only differentiators.  This must change if the industry is truly committed to achieving a structure where it earns at least it cost of capital.

Loyalty has increasing value to air travel consumers today, in part because elite members of frequent flyer programs typically aren’t charged the ancillary fees other passengers pay.  Base fares will be disciplined by competition whether American is successful in its attempt to rewrite distribution rules or not.  This industry always adapts.  Travel agents continue to exist today even after the industry stopped paying domestic commissions in 2002 – assuming they evolved and adapted to find replacement revenue streams. 

One can make a case that the GDS have been every bit as destructive a tool as constructive.  Any system that promotes adding inefficient capacity should be changed.  They served their purpose when market share was king.  They serve significantly less purpose in an industry increasingly focused on its bottom line.  Short term this may be about saving some portion of a booking fee.  More important is the long term notion that an airline that takes control of its inventory creates value for its customers based on the knowledge the airline has of its customer.  To say the customer loses out is a tired refrain coming from the same "Chicken Littles" that "Cry Wolf" every time the industry tries to institute systemic change. 

Let the restructuring continue.

Patience and Perseverance: Tilton Walks It Like He Talks It

There is no way to describe United Airline leader Glenn Tilton other than resilient.  He is disliked internally by organized labor and questioned externally by nearly everyone who has an eye on this industry.  He has taken his role as the industry spokesperson seriously, perhaps more seriously than anyone before him.  We listen intently to Giovanni Bisignani, the CEO of IATA.  But we do not listen enough to Tilton. Why? Because Tilton’s is a message of change not cluttered by this industry’s history, and some people don’t like the message.

Tilton was quoted shortly after United ended a three year stay in bankruptcy: “If I were able to draw a visual image of the beginning (of bankruptcy) to today, it would be one continuous experience of knocking down internal and external barriers.”  In his role as chief spokesperson for the US airline industry as Chairman of the Board of the Air Transport Association, Tilton waxes philosophical about the barriers that impede the industry’s natural evolution.

I have a long history at United and knew the “old company” well.  United epitomized all that was wrong with the US airline industry prior to its bankruptcy in December of 2002.  One of Tilton’s predecessors as CEO, Stephen Wolf, did some very good things along the way that provided United with its global roots.  But even Wolf did little to address the company’s bloated cost structure and a management bureaucracy that often resulted in paralysis.  For every cubicle in Elk Grove Village, one could find at least one silo. 

Tilton cares less about the history of United than its future.  His history lesson was a short one – whatever structure in place when he arrived in 2002 did not work and therefore needed to be changed.  If Tilton was wed to preserving United’s legacy, then he likely would not have taken the same course in fundamentally reshaping the company. He would not have taken on the pilot union, ALPA, over its actions to disrupt United’s operations – winning an airtight legal victory for management that ranks among the most significant victories in decades.  Rather he would have permitted bad behavior – or paid the pilots to stop behaving badly - just as prior administrations had done. 

Today United is a lot smaller, with a mainline operation 30 percent smaller than it was 10 years ago.  For this, Tilton takes a lot of heat.  As the pilots union watches its ranks diminish, ALPA constantly reminds Tilton that an airline cannot shrink its way to profitability.  This may have been true in United’s past, but on Tilton’s watch growth will only occur if it is profitable growth.  It is hard to envision a day when United will again have 12,000 pilot equivalents on the payroll.

Tilton and others recognize that the industry is still too big.  In the most read Swelblog article to date, Montie Brewer makes a clear case that the industry’s capacity-lead business model is the number one reason why the airline industry will never be profitable over a sustainable period.  Also weighing in on the subject is Professor Rigas Doganis who writes about over capacity in Airline Business.  According to Doganis, the airline industry is inherently unstable and airlines have only themselves to blame for the constant state of oversupply and the downward pressure on fares that result.

Doganis goes on to discuss how airlines are “spasmodically” profitable, quoting Tilton on the fact that the industry has "systematically failed to earn its cost of capital."  This is a fact that has long bothered the former oilman.  In a recent speech to the Wings Club in New York, Tilton raised the industry’s continuing and daunting challenge: “How to navigate to sustainable profitability in light of our financial instability.”

In London he made the point again and differently:  “Volatility and losses have been the norm for this industry, as has our systemic failure to earn our cost of capital and achieve any level of consistent financial resilience. The industry has lost nearly $50 billion worldwide since 2000 and a staggering $11 billion last year alone.”

Tilton at United – From Hands On to Chief Strategist

One can be sure that when Tilton arrived at United in September 2002, he had little idea just how bad things were.  But he would soon find out.  Three months after his arrival in Elk Grove Village, United landed in a downtown Chicago courtroom for more than three years as the company restructured itself.  There were mistakes along the way.  There was some bad luck along the way particularly as it pertained to rising values in the aircraft market.  There was the decision to terminate employee defined benefit plans, which among other things permanently damaged Tilton’s reputation in the labor ranks, but enabled the airline to get the exit capital it needed to start anew.

As United exited bankruptcy protection in February 2006, oil prices were on the rise.  The company restructured itself around $55 per barrel oil – a price that was fast becoming a memory and a bad assumption in the company’s plan of reorganization.  Company performance – operational, financial or otherwise – was nowhere near expectations set based on an entity that had spent three years fixing itself.  For either right or wrong reasons, Tilton kept many of United’s legacy management team around to complete the bankruptcy process.  What he belatedly came to appreciate is that leadership at the company had to change – and change it did.

United mainline is much smaller today than it was the day it emerged from bankruptcy.  Tilton oversaw its downsizing in bankruptcy and continued the work as oil prices climbed.  But he also recognized that he was not the guy to handle the day to day operations. Like any good restructuring guy, Tilton knew to hand over the operation of the company to others on the executive team, particularly  John Tague, Kathryn Mikells and Pete McDonald.

And the plan seems to be finally working.  United is starting to produce some good results.  There might be a lesson here for others in the industry, including the consideration of whether CEOs should delegate the day-to-day functions and concentrate on their role as the company’s chief strategist.  Just as pivotal, in United’s case at least, was Tilton’s decision to focus on tearing down the barriers to change – something all industry CEOs should consider in improving the financial prospects for a once proud industry relegated to underperformance, in part by the stakeholders who benefit from its inefficiency.

Tilton and Government

In one way or another, Tilton delivers the message that “no matter how well United or any U.S. carrier transforms its business, none of us will be as strong as we should be - much less in a position to compete in the emerging global aviation industry - if there's no change to the regulatory environment in which we operate.” Without a coherent U.S. aviation policy that “reverses the bias against airline size and removes the barriers that prevent us from constructive consolidation, U.S. carriers will be unable to compete on a global scale and we risk being marginalized,” Tilton said.

Among the questions for the industry, as Tilton outlined in a talk to the UK Aviation club, is what motivates the protectionists’ view of the industry.  “What is it that they are “protecting? A chronically underperforming industry?” he asked.

Concluding Thoughts

For what it’s worth, I focus on Tilton not because of his work at United but because of the message he delivers and its relevance to the rest of the industry.

As I predicted in my last post, February 2010 has been a significant month for airline news – some of it good and some of it bad like government’s call for slot divestitures in the USAirways – Delta slot swap.  It appears likely that oneworld will get permission to compete on an equal footing with the STAR and SkyTeam alliances.  This is the necessary next step to ensure inter-alliance competition as we think and talk about the industry’s structure going forward.   Tilton is a huge proponent of alliances who quickly recognized that one airline cannot be everything to everybody and that network scope and scale can be economically garnered through partnerships that leverage each member airline’s strengths.

Tilton also remains a proponent of consolidation.  His voice is growing increasingly louder on the subject of cross-border mergers and the flow of capital based his belief that the US and the European Union should move forward on Phase II of a transatlantic agreement and pave the way to permitting cross border commercial activity in the airline industry.  As Tilton noted in his UK speech, “capital is global and doesn't have sovereign inhibitions."

Like him or not, Tilton rarely shies away from stating his views, even at the risk of ruffling some stakeholder’s feathers.  For Tilton, too many people focus on the past rather than the future and what needs removed in order that the industry can continue to evolve. That evolution may continue to prove painful for some in the industry as Open Skies and re-shaped alliances bring new competition all the while presenting new opportunities for agile and nimble operators.

Tilton’s role, like that of the Anderson, Arpey, Smisek , Parker and other airline CEOs, is to serve as agents of that change and find a way to balance the demands and interests of labor, shareholders and other stakeholders that depend on a robust, profitable industry.

Note:  I hold stock and options in Hawaiian Holdings, Inc. as a result of my Board position.  I also hold stock in United Airlines accumulated at various points in time since the company emerged from bankruptcy.

Montie Brewer: Five Reasons Why the Airline Industry Will Never be Profitable

Stuffing Romy’s Thanksgiving Turkey with Items for Secretary LaHood to Consider

On Friday, November 20, Montie Brewer, most recently Air Canada’s President and CEO, made a presentation at MIT titled:  “Five Reasons Why the Airline Industry Will Never be Profitable.”  Prior to making his way to Air Canada in 2004, Mr. Brewer (Montie) held senior positions at United Airlines, Northwest Airlines, Republic Airlines, Braniff and Trans World Airlines. He has planned and developed over 20 hub operations worldwide and played an integral role in the founding of the STAR alliance. 

I sat down with Montie following his presentation with the intention to write about it, but also to use his talk as context as Secretary of Transportation Ray LaHood considers establishing a Blue Ribbon panel to study the woes of the U.S .airline industry.  It seems like the perfect stuffing for 2009’s Thanksgiving turkey.

Brewer’s Five Reasons Why the Airline Industry Will Never be Profitable

The boom and bust cycles of airline industry earnings are well documented, as is the fact that subsequent down cycles to industry up-cycles destroy those earnings and more.  The fact remains that any annual airline industry profits rarely exceed the average pre-tax earnings for U.S. corporations. As a preface to his talk, Brewer made clear it would be wrong to surmise individual airlines will not be profitable. Instead he contends the industry will always suffer due to structural reasons.  

  1.  It’s A Capacity Lead Business Model (Causes Constant Overcapacity)

Since deregulation the airline product has been commoditized.  In the commodity framework, the only way the industry, or an airline, can grow revenue is to grow capacity.  Then, the Computer Reservations Systems and the Global Distribution Systems institutionalized the notion that in order for an airline to grow revenue, it needed to offer more and more capacity even before demand warranted.

The addition of capacity led to low and lower operating costs.  On the margin, revenue exceeded cost.  Uneconomic capacity was being deployed each and every day.  Ultimately an industry too big to be sustainable was created.   

The GDS’s were a major contributor to the commoditization of the airline product.  Based on this fact, airlines that distribute directly to the consumer have the best likelihood of differentiating, and more importantly, not commoditizing, their product.  This fact contributes to the notion that certain airlines can do well while the industry suffers. 

  2.   Airplanes Don’t Go Away (They Just Become More Efficient)

A bad airline industry assumption is consolidation of the industry, whether through a merger or carrier liquidation, leads to industry capacity reduction.  The airline industry time and again has demonstrated that once a carrier’s capacity is pushed to the edge, that carrier’s capacity (efficient and inefficient) does not go away.

With the working premise that the only way to grow revenue is to grow capacity, then new aircraft need to ordered.  The problem is aircraft do not go away, and: aircraft do not make their way from an inefficient operator to a more efficient operator; aircraft CAN fly forever; even when an airline tries to retire aircraft, they come back like a bad spaghetti sauce (remember ValuJet using Delta’s DC-9s to compete directly with them in Atlanta); and, when carriers grow they realize great efficiencies. 

An example of those efficiencies is a 3 percent growth in capacity results in only a 1 percent increase in total operating costs.  However, this works in reverse when carriers pull capacity down as the cost savings cannot be achieved commensurate with the reduction.  This fact is what plagues the industry today as a floor is created on just how much capacity can be reduced by any one airline.  

[Note:  If Brewer had his way, Airbus and Boeing would each be allowed to produce 10 new aircraft per year but he would allow the manufacturers to charge whatever amount they could earn on each of those 10 aircraft.]

  3.   Labor Leverage (Political Organizations Cannot Manage Commercial Reality)

Labor organizations are not structured to manage the responsibility they possess.  In Brewer’s view labor has tremendous leverage over the industry.  However, they are highly simple political organizations and, as such, only have a short-term view.  For the politicians, the short-term view is to remain in their elected position.  To overcome this flaw, labor organizations need to completely overhaul their governance structure. 

Like the ordering of airplanes, management historically reaches agreements with labor at the very end or the peak of economic up cycles and then faces the prospect of paying the bill during subsequent downturns.  Given the high fixed costs of the industry, airlines can rarely afford a strike or intermittent work stoppages.  During negotiations, both the airline and labor pretend management is in control.  According to Brewer, the working assumption is management will not allow labor to take too much, but in reality, labor can take all it wants - - then both live with the outcome.  Brewer believes, when costs like labor, fuel, maintenance, airport fees are factored in on a daily basis, the typical airline has 10 - 20 profitable days a year.

With 10-20 days of revenue to spend, some in labor have asked, “Why would management agree to a contract it can’t afford”?  Well, because somewhere during the year, fuel exceeded budget, or the government issued a new airworthiness directive involving aircraft in an airline's fleet, or airport fees increased, or…….the false belief that management will contain labor’s desires from doing stupid things.

  4. Input Costs are Too Volatile (Revenue Cycle and Cost Cycle Out of Sync)

Even in the best of years, the airline industry is a low margin business where it is not uncommon for any number of input costs to increase at least 20 percent.  A low margin business with volatile input costs is a toxic mix.  A good example occurred in 2008 when the price of oil increased from $80 per barrel to $147.  As is typical in the airline business, tickets are often purchased months in advance.  During the first half of 2008, it was not uncommon for passengers to be flying in June on a ticket purchased when oil was $50 per barrel cheaper.

Is the relationship of volatile costs relative to revenue impossible to manage?  No, but it would require companies to maintain outsized cash balances. Cash balances that look good to labor during contract negotiations and to financial raiders seeking to buy a company to harvest that cash.

  5.  Nobody Really Wants It to Be Fixed

Brewer makes a powerful case that things are fine the way they are… and, for the most part, the airline industry value chain, consumers and the government know it.

When it comes to low fares, the consumer can shop the internet and find some market on sale. They may even find the price of a ticket today equal to, or less, in nominal dollars than a fare charged two decades ago.  When adjusted for inflation, it is hard to find any consumer item that is a better bargain than air travel.

Taxes and fees are nearly $60 - or 20 percent - of the price of a ticket today.  This compares to $22, or 7 percent, in 1972.  The government is getting a bigger share of a shrinking pie. 

Perhaps, most compelling is the industry's value chain like airline catering, aircraft lessors, ground handling, manufacturers, airports, distribution systems, fueling; travel agents, maintenance repair organizations and freight operations.  Each of these industry sectors in the airline industry value chain earn a higher return on invested capital than the airline companies that keep them in business. 

Some Questions for Secretary LaHood to Ponder

• Can a commodity business (airline business) that does not have to be a commodity business (too much supply) be permitted to change sufficiently by its stakeholders to achieve sustained profitability? 
• Can an industry where inefficient capacity never leaves achieve sustained profitability? 
• Can an industry where organized labor has outsized leverage but cannot manage the inherent responsibilities that come with that leverage change sufficiently in order for the industry to achieve sustained profitability? 
• Can an industry with widely volatile input costs raise sufficient capital to manage its business without being raided by either a financial investor or a stakeholder seeking outsized payments?
• Can an industry where every stakeholder seems to be happy with the way it is, including governments and their constituents, consider making the necessary changes in order for the industry to achieve sustained profitability?

Any Discussion Must Begin With a Plan for Roads, Rail and Runways

To date, the only public suggestions that I have seen for the Secretary to consider in forming the panel come from Kevin Mitchell at the Business Travel Coalition.  Mitchell, who participated in the Secretary’s discussion with various stakeholders on November 12, wrote LaHood outlining five issues that need studying by the proposed commission:

• No National Air Transportation Policy
• Airline Over-Scheduling
• Broken Industry Work Force Model
• Obsolete Air Traffic Control Technology
• Airline Industry Financial Failure

Mitchell also outlined causes of each, including unbridled faith in market forces; lack of government and industry foresight and leadership; lack of a productive labor-management model; unworkable industry financial model; ineffective FAA management; fragmented industry positions and lack of Congressional leadership. While Mitchell is thoughtful about the problems and their causes, parts of his list of those affected sounds more like advocacy for his clients.

Swelbar’s View

Among the best of Mitchell’s observations is the need for a coherent transportation policy.  That policy, though, should not focus on an alleged broken regional airline business model; tarmac delays; that the industry is no longer a desired profession; pressure on safety margins; loss of skilled jobs; lost service; or a loss of international leadership. 

The transportation policy should be about roads, rails and runways -- period. After all, there must be some very good reason why Warren Buffett is spending $34 billion to buy Burlington Northern? For aviation specifically, it should address the need to define, resize and equip the desired infrastructure for the 21^st Century. For airports that might be disenfranchised from the air transportation grid, do highways need to be built that easily facilitate a different access point for those air travel consumers?  It should not be about championing a unique labor force that already has considerable power and very good paying jobs relative to the overall work force or the calls of various consumer advocates.

Organized labor was a force behind LaHood's consideration to form a commission to study the airline industry.  But nowhere based on what I have read does labor accept any responsibility for the current condition of the industry.  Times have changed, and unions need to understand that. For organized labor – and by extrapolation, airline labor – to be successful, the unions can no longer be in the business of keeping themselves in business. It has to be about meaningful change. Change that entails understanding the new economic realities, or as the Harvard Business Review recently opined “that there will be no going home again…that the landscape of business has been forever altered.” [actually this question can be asked of every airline industry stakeholder] Can unions change or adapt to the idea that instead of being in business to secure decent jobs for the greatest number of people it might be better off securing great jobs for fewer workers?

Mitchell identifies the right stakeholders, but doesn’t ask ALL of the right questions.  Brewer poses the right questions and does not suggest the market can answer them all.  The answers lie in what this blog is about -- change:  can industry stakeholders change and surrender unrealistic expectations of the past?  Despite all of the cuts, we still have too much capacity, leading to too many inefficient operations, which lead to a government that really does not want to get out of the way --- because it has a stake in that inefficiency.

I hope that the administration is really going to evaluate the industry and recognize that all stakeholders need to change.  And much of the change that needs to take place begins and ends with government accepting that an industry 50 years old ... well, needs to change.

More to come.

Dynamic, Dynamic, Dynamic; Bless Air Canada; and the Education of Stakeholders

Like Holly Hegeman at Planebuzz.com, I am having my own computer week from hell and as a result I am cranky. In my crankiness, I am actually thinking about the shot-gun wedding of airline labor and airline consumers, destined to fail, first initiated by the Business Travel Coalition.

This post is kinda about international alliances. Moreover, it is kinda about international alliances not being on the same page. I understand that without Anti-Trust Immunity (ATI), carriers are limited in their discussions with one another. But I find that Air Canada’s decision to rescind second bag charges at a time when United announced it would double its fee for a second bag to be a black eye for the STAR Alliance. North America is one thing. Tomorrow is not about North America.

What good is my STAR Alliance Gold Card if I do not have a clue? And I pay attention. Let’s be honest and frank here, Air Canada, under the leadership of Montie Brewer, has done great things with the internet. They have taught us about simplicity and transparency while teaching the air travel consumer about the concept of “value-added” services when making decisions to purchase an Air Canada product. These include preferred departure times, seats, meals etc.

Further, let’s not let it be lost that Air Canada’s approach, begun long before US carrier’s decisions about ancillary fees, gives them a leg up on the consumer education aspect. So, rather than charge for a second bag, Air Canada will roll its previously stated fuel surcharge associated with buying a seat on a particular sector into the base fare.

Ben Smith, Air Canada’s Executive Vice President and Chief Commercial Officer said: "These initiatives are made possible by the recent relief from all-time high oil prices and even though fares will remain dynamic”. Dynamic is the key word in this phrase. It simply means volatility. We can expect volatility going forward. The fact that a barrel of oil has dropped $55 per barrel in a little over 60 days after rising nearly $60 per barrel in a little over 200 days we should not immediately jump to the conclusion that the global industry is out of the woods. For statistical types: what is the standard deviation?

Air Canada does have it right. If dynamic cost increases are plaguing the industry, then let fares be dynamic. Addressing, and implementing, these processes goes a step further to educate the consumer and labor on the argument that the industry simply cannot sustain a fixed cost, fixed fare, environment that does not produce a profit for those providing the metal. Moreover, dynamic pricing is about addressing the boom and bust cycle that has plagued this industry for nearly three decades. It is about the education of stakeholders.

US carriers are using volatility to create rigidity through ancillary charges. And that is what defines legacy in many ways. Dynamic should be the word of the day. Dynamic is the action that needs to describe the immediate future of this industry as well as the outcome of the next labor negotiations – any airline’s largest controllable expense. Sadly, no US carrier is articulating this point.

Whereas labor continues to assimilate consumer issues into its leverage-grab for higher wages, dynamic base fares versus second bag charges best exemplify the issue describing why we need a flexible labor construct. This boom and bust cycle simply must end. We really need to think about this.

And if we are going to make an alliance argument, let's make one as differentiation is lost.