What's United Airlines thinking?

An article in today's Chicago Tribune on United (www.ual.com) suggests that the firm has presented a plan to creditors that focuses on the business traveler or "road warrior". The assumption is that these individuals and their companies are willing to pay big bucks for business travel. What a load of hooey.

First of all, many of the so called "road warriors" are salespeople. In today's economy, most businesses are cutting back on travel, even for sales people. Moreover, when they do fly, they're looking for low-cost alternatives. How does United think it got into this mess? While they were busy raising prices to offset costs, Southwest (www.southwest.com) ATA (www.ata.com) and Airtran (www.airtran.com) have steadily been taking business travel. In the last year, I've met an increasingly growing number of businesspeople on these airlines, particularly when the travel is last minute and a United flight to Seattle is nearly $2,000 while Southwest is less than $500.

I'll be eager to see what United comes up with for "road warriors". I hope it's better than paying an extra $1,500 for that trip to Seattle just to gain 3,400 frequent flyer miles.

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