Hawaii for a buck? Mesa Air Group's (NASDAQ: MESA) go! Airlines has nine-upped Skybus's $10 tickets by offering 2,000 $1 flights to Hawaii. The tickets, which went on sale Monday, were quickly snatched up.
The move is bound to ruffle the feathers of competitors Aloha and Hawaiian (AMEX: HA), who filed a lawsuit late last year claiming Mesa had used confidential information the two had shared with Mesa as a potential investor to launch go!'s Hawaii service. The $1 promotion can only make the fare fight fiercer, good news for vacationers to the sunny islands.
Skybus, the newest RyanAir-model entry into the industry, has gained a great deal of attention for its practice of selling ten $10 seats on each flight. The remaining seats are sold, exclusively via its web site, on a sliding scale, growing more expensive as the plane approaches capacity.
Skybus's severely no-frills approach has put price pressure on budget competitors including Southwest (NYSE: LUV), Airtran (NYSE:AAI) and JetBlue (NASDAQ:JBLU). At a time when passenger traffic is softening and fuel prices skyrocketing, the prospect of a mini price-war among the bottom feeders doesn't seem strong. I can still hope, though -- I really would like to visit Hawaii.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
6-13-2007 @ 4:08PM
mattydread said...
From an investment standpoint, this is pretty interesting. But if I were shopping for plane tickets to Hawaii, I would look elsewhere out of fear that I might get what I was paying for. ;p
6-13-2007 @ 4:11PM
tom.barlow said...
Unfortunately, it's all too common to get $1 service for a $400 ticket these days. :)
9-11-2007 @ 4:44AM
Fred Parkhurst said...
Will they let you off the plane when you have a $1 ticket. It sounds very risky you try for one of the lower priced tickets and you might get stuck with a $400 one. You are playing the lotery.