Spirit Airlines has announced that it will begin flying between Dallas and Chicago (DFW to ORD) on August 18th.  Right now, I see 2 frequencies each way between the cities and they’re pretty convenient times.

This is smart on the part of Spirit because they’re striking at American Airlines as a function of performing this service at DFW to ORD and they’re competing with SWA on value.  Both AA and SWA have far more frequencies but the typical Spirit customer can be bled off from both companies for different reasons. 

This might spur a price competition between the 3 airlines but I kind of doubt it.  Spirit has many downsides too.  Everything is a fee on this airline and some of those fees are pretty expensive.  The seating is *not* even as comfortable as American Airlines (and I consider AA to be pretty uncomfortable.)  The frequencies aren’t enought o compete for any business traffic but, then, Spirit isn’t after the business traveler anyway.

I’m glad to see them enter into the market.  However, I’ll also say that it is highly unlikely that I would ever use them myself.

Filed under: Airline News by ajax