Case Study Of Air Southwest Airlines

Southwest Airlines Co., established in 1971 by Rollin King and Herb Kelleher, began its operations with only three Boeing 737 aircrafts. It is headquartered in Dallas, Texas(Hawkins, Misra, & Tang, 2012). Southwest is well known as one of the largest low-cost carriers. With this strategy, the company has dramatically grown up and deeply rooted in the US airline industry. Now, Southwest Airlines Co. operates 633 aircrafts to 93 domestic cities and the highest number of passengers used Southwest Airlines to fly around U.S in Jan 2014 (Hawkins, Misra, & Tang, 2012). To accomplish more than 40th consecutive years of both profitability and competitiveness, Southwest Airlines Company is constantly trying to find the routes to differentiate itself from other domestic carriers (Hawkins, Misra, & Tang, 2012).

Southwest airlines, the largest low-cost carrier in the U.S with its headquarters located in the Dallas, Texas. The airline was started in 1967 and it adopted its current name sometime in 1971.The mission of the company is the dedication to the very highest quality of customer care with a delivery covered with a sense of warmth, individual pride, friendliness as well as company spirit. This mission is dedicated to the giving of ordinary people a chance to fly. The company's mission towards its employees is to provide them with a stable work environment and an equal level of opportunity to spark learning as well as personal growth. The company also encourages innovation and creativity for improving the level of effectiveness of its operations. It does this by providing the employees with equal levels of concern, caring attitude as well as respect. The company's vision is to have a conservative increase in the level of

Southwest Airlines was started 45 years ago in 1967 by two entrepreneurs: Herb Keller and Rollin King who had the right vision and culture by which to become successful entrepreneurial leaders. This vision was achieved as Southwest Airlines became the greatest airline in the USA. As a young business in the airlines industry, Southwest Airlines in the initial years confronted very tough situations, and it was due proper planning and with the assistance of its employees that kept Southwest Airlines afloat from sinking. There were already pioneer big companies well established in the airlines industry when Southwest Airlines joined the industry. Some of these companies had a good share of

Southwest Airline was from an idea on a napkin between Rollin King and Herb Kelleher. Eventually, after a few regulation issues, the airline became official on focusing point-to-point travel between Dallas, Houston, San Antonio. One of the early key success factors which stated in the case, “ In contrast to larger airlines servicing the cities through connecting interstate routes, Southwest would fly directly to each of the cities, and the flights would take roughly one hour each.” Not only Southwest has the advantage of time but also the trust on safety from frequent flyers by having a direct flight to each city. Likewise, within two years (1971-1973) due to price segmentation based on the time of before and after 7 PM along with weekends, the company became profitable.

Southwest’s primary competitors are JetBlue and Spirit Airlines. These two airlines, like Southwest, focus on innovation and low airfare costs. Among the largest airlines are American, Delta, and United. However, these mainline carriers are far from posing any major threat to Southwest. (Coulter, pg 253)

Southwest Airlines began operations in 1971, with the company's initial service taking place between Dallas, Texas, Houston, Texas, and San Antonio, Texas (Southwest Airlines, 2006). Rollin King and Herb Kelleher started the company with a simple mission focused on being different than other airlines; their chief focus was to provide on time flights at a low cost, along with a bit of fun (Southwest Airlines). As Welch (2005) argued, Southwest Airlines was the world's richest and most profitable airline, illustrating the success the company enjoyed as a result of a simple, yet practical strategy. Hill & Jones (2004) explained that an emergent strategy

Southwest Airlines is one of the largest airlines in the United States by number of passengers carried each year (Inkpen, 2013). The company had been profitable for decades unlink other major competitors and also was able to weather 2008-09 recession (Inkpen, 2013). At southwest, leadership philosophy is to manage well at good times to prosper through bad times (Inkpen, 2013). The airlines we found by Herb Kelleher and San Antonio in the year 1970. Southwest began flying in year 1971 in three Texas cities with three aircrafts and 25 employees. Its initial focus: Short-haul, point-to-point flights, a fleet of Boeing 737s, low fares and high-frequency flights (Inkpen, 2013). In year 2012, 81% of its passengers booked tickets via

1966: Rollin King marched into Herb Kelleher’s law office with a plan to start a low-cost/low-fare airline that would shuttle passengers between San Antonio, Dallas, and Houston. Thought of this idea because businessmen were complaining about the commute.

Southwest Airlines was co-founded by Herb Kelleher who had a vision to create an airline that removed none needed services and used smaller airports in order to provide a low cost service (fare) to flyers. He is known for his leadership style and remained the CEO of

operated. During this time, travel agent fees were going through the roof and reserving an airline ticket was a complicated, drawn-out process. To counter this, Southwest implemented its own reservation system tailored to their own needs, which also included the industry’s first paperless ticketing system; but this wasn’t the end of IT innovation from Southwest Airlines. In 1995, Southwest.com was launched, and the online ticketing and reservation system was launched in 1996. Soon thereafter, Southwest Airlines ticket sales were primarily coming from their online reservation system (70%). By the late 90’s, Southwest.com was the most visited airline website [4].

Southwest Airlines is a low-cost airline carrier that has been operating in The United States since 1967. The company is one of the most successful airlines in the market, putting their employees first in order of importance. Just like all the other companies out there, Southwest Airlines has its own SWOT Analysis. The company’s analysis consists of the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threads. This analysis is often used as part of the company’s strategic planning, which plays an important role for decision making. The analysis gives a deeper understanding of the internal attributes and resources as well as the external factors of the company. Many of the company’s weaknesses can be turned into strengths as well as many threats can be turned into opportunities.

One of the most important standpoints to look at when improving the business’s overall welfare, is of course marketing. Southwest Airlines is a predominantly prosperous organization with many strengths and opportunities. Although a successful airline service, Southwest still of course has many weaknesses as well as threats. Looking at Southwest Airlines from the point of view of the organization’s Vice President, the issue that I would focus on first is the fact that Southwest Airlines only caters to the budget traveler.

This proposal addresses the needed steps to be taken in order for Southwest Airlines to see continued growth in the airline industry. Southwest Airlines has been able to remain one of the most profitable airlines in the industry for an extended period of time. Even with the hindrance of the 2001 terrorist attacks involving airplanes and the U.S recession of 2008, Southwest has continued to see strong revenue growth. Meanwhile, other companies were experiencing major losses and in some cases folding. Southwest Airlines has capitalized on the company’s strength of being the top low cost

Southwest was founded by Rolla King and Herb Kelleher in Dallas in 1966. The core of the business is to provide low-fare and short-haul flight service to their customers through low cost operation. By consistently focus on this core philosophy, Southwest has grown to become one of the largest airlines in the United States, competing with other major carriers including the Big Three – Delta, United and American Airline.

Southwest Airlines provides short haul, high frequency, point-to-point, low-fare services to and from 58 cities across the United States. The company is known for its low-cost fares and superior customer service in the airline industry. The company was started in 1971 with a motto still lived by today, "If you get your passengers to their destinations when they want to get there, on time, at the lowest possible fares, and make darn sure they have a good time doing it, people will fly your airline." This motto has been effective for the company because they recently reported their 58th straight quarterly profit.