Air Travel in Ten Years

Arnold

Arnold

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Arnold
This thread: www.pilotsofamerica.com/community/threads/anyone-know-whats-going-on-with-spirit.133509/

Got me thinking about the future of air travel. So I've come up with some predictions. Because my ability to predict the future is limited to where my next footstep will land this is of course just as valid as any other prediction.

1) 80% of domestic pax will pay fares that are built on the ULCC model.
2) 40% - 60% of business pax will be utilizing 135 operators using the shared charter model.
3) Business travel will be down 50% from the pre-pandemic model and stay there.

If I were building an aviation empire now I'd be building out a shared charter network.

Your thoughts?
 
Electric monorails everywhere. Electric airplanes will tether to them like kites.
 
Arnold said:
This thread: www.pilotsofamerica.com/community/threads/anyone-know-whats-going-on-with-spirit.133509/

Got me thinking about the future of air travel. So I've come up with some predictions. Because my ability to predict the future is limited to where my next footstep will land this is of course just as valid as any other prediction.

1) 80% of domestic pax will pay fares that are built on the ULCC model.
2) 40% - 60% of business pax will be utilizing 135 operators using the shared charter model.
3) Business travel will be down 50% from the pre-pandemic model and stay there.

If I were building an aviation empire now I'd be building out a shared charter network.

Your thoughts?
Click to expand...

I doubt any of these will happen. Things will go back to where they were unless a disruptive technology emerges. If self driving cars on highways becomes real, then short and medium haul air travel will decline. 135 operations will always exist for those who need to get somewhere in a hurry and don't care about cost. That population is somewhat fixed, so I don't think the volume will change. Overseas air travel will probably stay for at least another century.
 
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Arnold said:
This thread: www.pilotsofamerica.com/community/threads/anyone-know-whats-going-on-with-spirit.133509/

Got me thinking about the future of air travel. So I've come up with some predictions. Because my ability to predict the future is limited to where my next footstep will land this is of course just as valid as any other prediction.

1) 80% of domestic pax will pay fares that are built on the ULCC model.
2) 40% - 60% of business pax will be utilizing 135 operators using the shared charter model.
3) Business travel will be down 50% from the pre-pandemic model and stay there.

If I were building an aviation empire now I'd be building out a shared charter network.

Your thoughts?
Click to expand...

My bet is that within the next ten years, somebody at one of the low end carriers will screw up maintenance to the point we have a major incident, and that will cause much hand waving and a major change to the little carriers. But I hope I'm wrong.
 
Until they get charter flights down to a comparable price as the airlines, business managers will ensure that charter flights are not allowed.
 
Ok, I’ll bite.

In ten years we’re going to see half of all new auto sales be electric and the infrastructure won’t have built out. The propensity for remote work will increase and cost of living will continue to drive workers out of large markets and towards current spoke cities. The hub/spoke model will become untenable and the best of the regionals will take over demand flying 75 seat jets spoke to spoke and spoke to hub.

Today’s majors will be left shuttling hub to hub, transcon, and overseas primarily supporting leisure travel. Flow agreements will be from today’s majors to tomorrow’s regional.
 
All good guesses but wrong. Pandemics will continue and we will find ourselves in complete lockdown except for the privileged few that must travel for the sake of the rest of us. Deliveries of supplies will by by drones and work from home will be the norm (unless the government is paying us not to).
 
Albany Tom said:
My bet is that within the next ten years, somebody at one of the low end carriers will screw up maintenance to the point we have a major incident, and that will cause much hand waving and a major change to the little carriers. But I hope I'm wrong.
Click to expand...
You mean like ValuJet? Didn't exactly kill the industry.
 
I would be genuinely surprised if business travel doesn't slack off some. The pandemic proved you can do a LOT remote, and it's a lot cheaper than airline tickets. Can't go on vacation using Zoom though.
 
Based on what I've seen at ATL, ROC, SLC, and ONT the last several weeks of travelling, other than seeing people wearing masks, one would think "What pandemic!?" It is by far busier than it was pre-pandemic. Of course, part of that is due to what I would guess still only about 70% of the check-in in staff being back to work, but still - I'm not seeing any empty seats on flights and the standby list is rarely empty before the flight is full. Heck, on Friday I let Delta pay me $100/hr to sit in the Sky Club for a few more hours so someone could have my seat on the earlier flight.
 
texasclouds said:
Electric monorails everywhere.
Click to expand...
I'm thinking more of those tubes we use at banks. I saw it on this documentary called Futurama.

latest
 
I predict that business travel will return eventually, with only an overall slight reduction. The pandemic forced the usage of video conferencing, but the technology wasn't anything new. We've had Go-to-Meeting and other platforms for years, and they do work for some remote meetings. But there is a lot more that can be accomplished face to face.

I've said it before, if I am XYZ corporation and am looking to contract for millions of dollars of widgets, and the choice comes down to two suppliers, one that calls me on Zoom and the other that shows up and shakes my hand, which one you think will get the contract. There will always be an advantage to face to face interaction.
 
In the company I work for, the pre-sales engineers such as myself used to travel around to customer sites for meetings all the time.

I was somewhat the exception to this as my territory is large enough that I insisted to use WebEx instead of flying around to meetings. Simply because my email goes nonstop while I am sitting in airports trying to get from here to there.

The year 2020 came and I appeared to be a visionary/genius to my peers because I have been doing this for a while now.

Now it’s 2021 and these travel budgets have not come back. The company is enjoying collaboration via zoom versus flying and travel expenses. We just had our western region meeting occur, and it was all done via zoom, as it was last yesr, too, and I know the company saved well over $100,000 each time with that decision.

I don’t see these corporate travel budgets ever getting near the level where they were pre-pandemic. It’s just simply an expense we’ve learned we don’t need.
 
Rgbeard said:
I don’t see these corporate travel budgets ever getting near the level where they were pre-pandemic. It’s just simply an expense we’ve learned we don’t need.
Click to expand...

Maybe not for your company, but many companies will think like this - until a competing company gets on a plane, goes and has drinks with the buyer/rep, and closes the deal. That will happen over all industries that are experiencing efficient sales-modes at present. It will popcorn, but will be right back to "altered" normal in time.

You can't hang out and bond the same over zoom. You can't frickin' taste great bourbon over zoom. - and fedexing someone a bottle is not the same as the sound and feel of a glass clinking in a dimly lit bar.
 
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Rgbeard said:
I don’t see these corporate travel budgets ever getting near the level where they were pre-pandemic. It’s just simply an expense we’ve learned we don’t need.
Click to expand...
I agree. My biggest customer is Apple and my company and theirs spent a lot of time flying back and forth from Texas to California to China, etc. Now they cut almost all travel, not based on budget, but because of COVID concerns. We've now proven most meetings can be accomplished via Zoom and I don't see it ever going back to the same amount of travel we saw before. I for one am okay with that! Too many nights in hotels over the years!
 
WBI Flyer said:
Maybe not for your company, but many companies will think like this, until a competing company gets on a plane, goes and has drinks with the buyer/rep, and closes the deal. That will happen over all industries that are experiencing efficient sales-modes at present. It will popcorn, but will be right back to "altered" normal in time.

You can't hang out and bond the same over zoom. You can't frickin' taste great bourbon over zoom. - and fedexing someone a bottle is not the same as the sound and feel of a glass clinking in a dimly lit bar.
Click to expand...

That is exactly my point. A lot of sales happen in a restaurant/bar rather than in a board room or office, and Zoom isn't going to replace that. Your business may not see that now, but your competitor will eventually.

One of our local business owners repeatedly credits the corporate aircraft for building his business, not his product and not his services.
 
steingar said:
I would be genuinely surprised if business travel doesn't slack off some. The pandemic proved you can do a LOT remote, and it's a lot cheaper than airline tickets. Can't go on vacation using Zoom though.
Click to expand...

Mostly in the short term. My wife and I know several people that are "back on the road".

There is a lot of demand to be back in person. That is especially true for the large meetings. There are no side conversations and other business dealings in a mega Zoom meeting that goes on at in-person meetings.

Some of those went virtual last year and earlier this year. I don't go to them, but have several friends in other industries that do, and my father goes as well; he still works on standards in the Power Industry. They are less than impressed with the virtual versions.

I see a bigger potential impact on universities. There was already online/remote learning before COVID; my sister got her PhD several years ago thru remote learning. Lots of kids will still want the "college experience", i.e. drinking/sex/partying, but there will be a budget conscious group that will sign-up for online learning.



Wayne
 
wayne said:
I see a bigger potential impact on universities. There was already online/remote learning before COVID; my sister got her PhD several years ago thru remote learning. Lots of kids will still want the "college experience", i.e. drinking/sex/partying, but there will be a budget conscious group that will sign-up for online learning.
Click to expand...
Midsemester I gave my students a poll, mostly for engagement purposes, though I did learn stuff. One of those questions was "what has most hindered your learning in this class". I honestly was prepared for a *****-fest featuring yours truly, but what I got was overwhelmingly that they didn't like the remote instruction one itty bit. I suspect my employer will not be scrapping its lecture halls any time soon.
 
jordane93 said:
Autonomous airplanes will be in charge of spraying chemtrails instead of pilots
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Blasphemy... No automation will be able to react quickly enough to make sure to specifically target all of the houses with [enter political party of your choice here] signs in their yard as quickly as a human can.
 
midwestpa24 said:
That is exactly my point. A lot of sales happen in a restaurant/bar rather than in a board room or office, and Zoom isn't going to replace that. Your business may not see that now, but your competitor will eventually.

One of our local business owners repeatedly credits the corporate aircraft for building his business, not his product and not his services.
Click to expand...

Bingo. Had a customer I've been working with for about a year now and had a couple of folks I just couldn't get over the hump with. Ended up on-site with them and after a few beers at a local microbrewery, we're good to go now and they're asking if we can provide more services. There is no replacement for in-face(ment).
 
I just flew my little Cherokee that could over 25 hours, from Ft. Worth to Denver, Cheyenne, Billings, North Dakota and...well, to Oshkosh...and home.

The trip was to see customers (and go to Airventure) that we haven't seen in two years. My business from them has already tripled with one of my customers and he introduced me to his competition, and me landing that customer. He was sick and tired of competing against the guy using sub standard products giving the whole industry in this little town a bad name, and while my prices are higher, no significant enough for him to be using the crap product.

There is nothing, I mean nothing, that can convince a customer to use your company/project like an in person visit.

I saw how one of my customers was using my products, and made a few suggestions. Ended up saving them about 30% labor cost on the builds and got me a huge feather in my cap.
 
wsuffa said:
You mean like ValuJet? Didn't exactly kill the industry.
Click to expand...

Yep. Except ValueJet was 20+ years ago, and it's been a while since we've had a major accident here with a large carrier. I believe the most recent was Buffalo, and while that didn't kill any carriers, it did shake some things up. I could be completely wrong, but don't think our risk tolerances are as low, and I'm certain that news media and the Internet is a lot more aggressive, than 20 years ago.

But cheap usually wins, and most people have short memories, so maybe nothing would happen.
 
I was a road whore for 12 years or so, most of it international. While a lot of preliminary work can be done via Zoom or other technologies, I agree with those whose believe it takes F2F to seal the deal if it’s a contract or some other transaction, e.g., a n acquisition or merger. And in some foreign countries especially, you are not getting the deal done until they see you and your team F2F. Even internal corporate board meetings or establishing the next strategic plan are difficult when crossing cultures. I remember working on a code of ethics that would cover our corporations and employees in about 20 nations. Just impossible to get it done over a Zoom type interface. We all finally met in Paris and in about 4 days worked out the differences that we couldn’t seem to get closed in 6 months. Having said this, I don’t wished to be back on the road ever again and am glad I retired. Road work is a killer no matter how proficient you get at it.
 
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