Fare Cuts Fail to Spur Gains Airlines Sought

Deep discounts for Christmas air travel have not produced as much business as airlines wanted and generally produced even less business than similar discounts at Thanksgiving, major carriers said Tuesday.

Some people who took advantage of the low Thanksgiving fares on impulse might have decided not to make another plane trip so soon afterward, spokesmen for some of the carriers surmised.

Also, since Christmas fell in the middle of the week this year, it was harder for would-be travelers to extend the holiday into a long weekend, the spokesmen said.

Most of the big airlines are offering some seats at 70% off the economy-class fare from Wednesday or Thursday through Saturday.

The cheap tickets are intended to fill planes during the traditionally slow Christmas week, when business travel drops off. They carry restrictions designed to keep travelers who would have flown anyway from taking advantage of them.

The airlines also have announced deals for around the New Year’s holiday and for most of January, February and March, an off-peak period for air travel.

Behind Thanksgiving

John Hotard, spokesman for Dallas-based American Airlines, called the response to the Christmas offer “pretty good” but said it was “probably not as successful as the Thanksgiving fare was.” American is the nation’s second-largest airline, after United Airlines.

Most airlines announced Christmas discounts around Dec. 10, and spokesman Joseph Hopkins of Chicago-based United said people might have made their travel plans by then.

“They’ve had limited impact,” he said, agreeing that the Thanksgiving fares were a bigger hit with the public.

“I don’t have any question that the bookings increased after the announcement was made, but probably not as much as people might have hoped,” said Dick Jones, spokesman for Atlanta-based Delta Airlines, the nation’s third-largest carrier.

The nation’s fifth-largest carrier Eastern Airlines, one of the few carriers that made figures available, said bookings were up 10% from last year’s strong Christmas travel period. Mark Wegel, a spokesman for the Miami-based airline, called that “an excellent response.”

Bookings Already Healthy

Sandra Allen, a spokeswoman for Frontier Airlines, said the Denver-based carrier has noticed “not too much stimulation” from the fare cuts. But she said bookings were already healthy before the announcement.

Minneapolis-based Republic Airlines, the seventh-largest carrier, expected to have about 80% of its seats filled around Christmas. But spokesman Walter Hellman said that the exceptionally strong performance is probably due to a streamlining of routes over the last year as much as to lower fares.

Delta’s Jones said the major airlines are offering the discounts in part to prove that price-conscious passengers can find seats as cheap as or cheaper than those on no-frills airlines such as People Express.

Louis Fourie, an airline analyst for the investment firm of Mabon, Nugent & Co., said that the airlines have avoided a costly fare war by targeting their offers to bargain hunters, excluding business travelers who would have flown anyway.

The airlines’ revenue probably is staying about even because of the balance between more traffic and lower fares, Fourie said.