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Southweat Airlines

In: Business and Management

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Southwest Airlines Case Analysis

Philemon Ngadigui

BUS 478

Cases in Strategic Mgt.

November 17, 2012

Introduction

The mission of Southwest Airlines is dedication to the highest quality of customer service delivered with a sense of warmth, friendliness, individual pride, and company spirit. a little more than forty years ago, Rolling King, owner of a small commuter airline, and Herb Kelleher, King’s lawyer, got together and decided to start a different kind of airline that would provide a short-haul, low-fair, high-frequency, point-to-point service in the United States. The company began service on June 18, 1971 with flights between Dallas, Houston, and San Antonio (“The Golden Triangle” as Herb called it), under the direction of Lamar Muse, who was brought in as a CEO. Muse was an aggressive and self confident airline veteran who knew the business well and who has the entrepreneurial skills to tackle the challenges of building the airline from scratch and then competing head-on with the major carriers. According to CNN.com citing the Fortune 500 journal, Southwest Airlines is the fourth largest customer airline carrier in the United States, and the 167th in the Fortune 500 annual ranking of America's largest corporations revue, with a annual revenue of $15,658.00 million . They use all Boeing 737 jets in order to save money on training and maintenance. The average age of company’s fleet is only 8.4 years. The average trip length is 451 miles with an average duration of about one hour and 23 minutes. Southwest Airlines averages more than 2,400 flights per day, almost twice the industry average. The average one-way airfare is $75. Southwest Airlines flies to 97 cities in 41 states ( southwest.com). LUV is Southwest's NYSE symbol, selected to represent the company's home at Dallas Love Field, as well as the theme of Southwest's employee and

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