What Are The Advantages And Disadvantages Of American Airlines

According to MBASkool (2015), a SWOT analysis has been completed to show some of the opportunities and threats that American Airlines faces. They are listed as follows:

Two of the largest competing airlines in America may seem to have a lot in common to a consumer’s eye: big commercial planes, friendly staff, one free carry-on bag, complimentary snacks. Maybe the biggest comparison of them all is how much of the airline market these two companies take up. But for every similarity, there must be a difference. Beyond contrasting ticket prices, there are many fronts on which to compare Southwest Airlines and American Airlines. To begin when the companies began, American Airlines was established approximately 40 years sooner than Southwest Airlines as a result of a merger. In terms of people, Southwest Airlines currently has just about half the number of employees that American does. However, to truly compare the two companies, the organization itself must be researched and analyzed. Southwest Airlines and American Airlines appear to be very different to this day in terms of organizational culture, team dynamics, and conflict and negotiation.

In 2015, it showed in the record that the number of employees American Airline has was 110,300 employees within different departments such as flight attendants, and ground workers and pilots. With this huge number of workers, they need a representative to make their rights will be claimed. That why American Airline has a voice with a different labor unions such as Association of Professional Flight Attendants (APFA), Air Line Pilots Association (ALPA), Transport Workers Union-International Association of Machinists alliance (TWU-IAM) and Allied Pilot Association (APA). Therefore, the airline will be forced to consider and listen to the labor unions and their demands to avoid strikes that can damage the reputation of the company.

The success of Southwest Airline and their substantial growth are unquestionable, despite some of their recent setbacks, and they are even used as an example in American business colleges as one of the best organizations to work for. They have been often praised for their culture of going the extra mile for their employees and customers; and consequently they have a series of unions which historically they have had good relations with. As previously discussed in actuality southwest is having some internal disputes over the new union contracts and this is causing turmoil within the company (Maxon, 2014).

This company has 69 years in the industry. It is one of the airlines that have played an important part in the

The Risk of Entry by Potential Competitors – Since the deregulation of the airline industry in 1978 over 1,300 new airlines have opened for business. However, most now are bankrupt or merged with the other carriers to stay workable. The established giants were Delta (merged with Northwest), American Airlines (merged with U.S. Airways), United Airlines (merged with Continental), and now Alaska Airlines (merged with Virgin America). Now the Low-Cost Carriers (LCCs) are posing a massive threat which includes Southwest Airlines (merged with Air Tran), and JetBlue.

American airline industry is steadily growing at an extremely strong rate. This growth comes with a number economic and social advantage. This contributes a great deal to the international inventory. The US airline industry is a major economic aspect in both the outcome on other related industries like tourism and manufacturing of aircraft and its own terms of operation. The airline industry is receiving massive media attention unlike other industries through participating and making of government policies. As Hoffman and Bateson (2011) show the major competitors include Southwest Airlines, Delta Airline, and United Airline.

* Contracts with competition. Their maintenance facility in Tulsa has started receiving other company’s planes for contracted repair. This is an opportunity to increase and build another addition onto American Airlines family.

At the onset of the airline industry in the United States, major network airlines were the sole providers of air travel. This multifaceted industry was a difficult industry to break into as a consequence of “sophisticated customer segmentation, hub-and spoke models and costly information systems for reservations, fare wars and intense competition” (Thompson 2008). Shrinkage in airline ticket prices augmented the demand for airline travel. Many markets were simply deserted or over-looked by major network airlines; this is a region a fresh “second tier of service providers” could enter into. This endeavor proved to provide a consumer savings of billions per year. Thus in June of 1971, after a tumultuous battle with other Texas-based

US Airways completed a merger in December 2013 . This merger provided much needed cash infusion into American Airlines, enabling it to emergency from

This way of dealing with things may not go through as well with other organizations. Also this may sometime in the future not workout so well with American Airlines as well.

British Airways (BA) is a company that encountered several difficulties back in the 1970’s and 1980’s. The poor performances of the organization, was leading the company to failure. BA was offering a service that even though it accomplished the mission of the company, was not providing customer satisfaction. The organization was not taking into consideration the needs of the costumer and was not providing an acceptable customer service experience. “Productivity at BA in the 1970s was strikingly bad, especially in contrast to other leading foreign airlines” (Jick, Peiperl, 2010, p.28). Due to numerous changes, the company increased their revenues and became a respectful and well know organization.

American Airlines was the United States’ largest carrier in 1992 with a fleet of 622 jet aircraft, flying 2,450 flights daily to 182 locations, as well as new innovative technology and programs. American Airlines was the first to introduce a computerized airline reservation system called Sabre, “Super Saver” fares and frequent flier programs. Regardless of the innovations, American Airlines and the airline industry was still not operating as profitably or providing customer satisfaction the way it should have in 1992. In 1991, As a result of a recession and the Gulf War, demand for air travel fell, fare wars came about, and the airlines

With 1988 operating income of $801 million on a revenue of $8.55 billion, American Airlines, Inc. (American), principal subsidiary of Dallas/Fort Worth-based AMR Corporation, was the largest airline in the United States. At year-end 1988 American operated 468 aircraft on 2,200 flights daily to 151 destinations in the United States, Bermuda, Canada, Mexico, the Caribbean, France, Great Britain, Japan, Mexico, Puerto Rico, Spain, Switzerland, Venezuela, and West Germany.

Aviancas performance cannot be measured only in cents and dollars. Avianca reported increase in passengers of 6.2m in Q1 of 2014, compared to 6.0m from Q1 2013. Avianca has been targeting newer markets every year, and searching for new customer base to increase its passenger flow. So far this has been successful as