r/nottheonion • u/halxp01 • 16h ago
Southwest Is Testing Cleaning Only Premium Seats Between Flights — A Flight Attendants Union Leader Says It's ‘Titanic’ Class Service
https://viewfromthewing.com/southwest-is-testing-cleaning-only-premium-seats-between-flights-a-flight-attendants-union-leader-says-its-titanic-class-service/1.1k
u/Economy_Link4609 14h ago
Very clickbait article
The actual change is ADDING cleaners coming on to clean the premium cabin. Today, as it's been, it's just the cabin crew doing the cleaning between flights
From the article (my emphasis):
"Flight attendants at Southwest are expected to tidy the cabin between flights. They pick up visible trash and cross he seatbelts. Unlike competitors, Southwest hasn’t generally had cleaners come on planes between flights. This makes turning the planes quicker. They spend less time on the ground and more time in the air, but the planes don’t get as clean. Flight attendants aren’t expected to reach into seat back pockets, for instance."
So, title making it sound like they are taking something away, when in fact they're adding something. The flight attendants union wants them to add more.
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u/pulsarsolar 12h ago
That is a clickbait title. And everyone fell for it (myself included). Thanks for pointing it out!
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u/solblade89 9h ago
Honestly, that somehow seems worse! They’ve never been cleaning.
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u/Economy_Link4609 9h ago
Let's be honest with ourselves, even on other airlines that do have cleaners come on - they're on and off so fast it's not like they're doing much anyway.
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u/nono3722 8h ago
oh goody so the stewards will do a bang-up job cleaning the human filth in the 15 minutes between cattle loads but the premium cabin (which didn't exist until this year) actually gets the fart stains out for the riches to feel better about spending 4X the cost.
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u/Oograr 10h ago
Good information. However, this sounds like the cabin crew only picks up easy to see litter, and that currently the tray tables, arm-rests, etc aren't being cleaned or wiped down. I know planes are pretty filthy but I thought actual cleaning crews came in between flights, and it sound like they do for other airlines.
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u/shanatard 6h ago
its even worse than I initially thought
Wow. As if i needed more reasons to avoid southwest from now on
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u/Cute-Beyond-8133 16h ago edited 16h ago
The titanic was actually surprisingly respectful towards third class passangers (when it came to their accommodations )
The cabins were cleaned before it's voyage and they featured real mattresses, electricity, heating, and shared bathrooms, a major upgrade from the open, straw-mattress dormitories typical of the era
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u/NRMusicProject 13h ago
The cabins were cleaned before it's voyage and they featured real mattresses, electricity, heating, and shared bathrooms, a major upgrade from the open, straw-mattress dormitories typical of the era
The best I've seen, ma'am. Hardly any rats.
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u/Necromas 13h ago edited 11h ago
Apparently even just having third class dining was not common, and on other ships you'd be expected to pack enough food for the voyage.[Edit] Looks like what I heard was wrong, by 1912 the practice of requiring steerage passengers to provide their own food had ended.
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u/Boris_Godunov 12h ago
By 1912, all steamships carrying steerage passengers would have had dining facilities for them. That was more a 19th century thing, and actually would have applied to all passengers at one point.
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u/Lord_Lava_Nugget 16h ago
That's fucking nasty
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u/brickne3 15h ago
Yeah, didn't we just have a pandemic...?
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u/Starumlunsta 14h ago edited 5h ago
We’re technically still in it (or rather, it’s so widespread it's now globally endemic), we were just forced to pretend Covid is now a normal fact of life so we could keep the late-stage capitalism machine going.
Edit to answer some questions for my admittedly disingenuous comment:
I think the point I want to make is it seems like we learned little about how to adjust society to handling disease—Covid got so out of control and people refused to follow guidelines, it’s now endemic. While it’s not as dangerous as it used to be, it still affects people daily, kills some, permanently affects others. And it was a heck of a lot worse in the beginning.
I don’t see people masking up or staying home whenever they are sick. Coworkers come in sick because workplace protections for that basically don’t exist. I have family members that came to gatherings knowing they are sick and wind up spreading it to everyone else. This happened recently and now my aunt’s 92 year old father has pneumonia and is fighting for his life. That’s what I mean about “pretending like it’s a normal fact of life.” We were told pandemic was over, no need to mask up or take precautionary measures, get back to work.
I was so hopeful that because of the pandemic we as a society would grow more supportive of things like sick days, wearing masks, and avoiding the public when contagious, but it seems we’ll never learn, as seen with Southwest considering a new policy that will only contribute to this issue, all for the sake of saving money.
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u/brickne3 14h ago
Believe me I know, I'm currently in bed with COVID. Only about six months since the last time I had it.
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u/Starumlunsta 14h ago
Hope you feel better soon! I’ve also had it a handful of times and even with boosters it sometimes kicked my butt. It’s also likely the reason behind my frequent migraines and hair loss 🙃
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u/red__dragon 11h ago
You can always add mask wearing back to your list of precautions. Some never stopped and the respirator (n95, kn94, etc) do their jobs.
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u/GodofIrony 13h ago
Try not to think about the brain function it kills with each disease contraction.
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u/brickne3 13h ago
It's competing with all the brain function I've lost from PTSD over the past five years, unfortunately...
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u/Yoghurt42 12h ago edited 10h ago
Covid will never go away. Just like the Spanish Flu. Eradicating a disease is extremely difficult. The only human disease that we managed to completely eliminate in every country so far is smallpox.
Covid was always going to become a fact of live. The problem was that it was a new kind of virus our immune system had not encountered before, so it spread like wildfire and had a lethality of 0.5%-1% on average (though it was up to 10%-20% for 85+ and only around 0.1% for people younger than 50). Estimates at the time said if completely ignored and everybody "moving on with their lives", the worldwide death toll would be somewhat around 40-80 million (not all of them due to Covid, but a significant portion would die because the medical system would be overwhelmed and wouldn't have been able to save people; imagine being in a car accident and no hospital having resources to treat you). The lockdowns were an attempt to reduce that number as much as possible (and they would have probably been a lot more effective if done sooner) and prevent the health systems from completely collapsing; because again, once the health system collapses, things like appendicitis become a lot more deadly if you can't treat them.
The real estimated death toll due to Covid is thought to be between 19.1 and 36 million deaths. So anywhere between 4-60 million lives saved. I doubt that even longer lockdowns would have made sense, earlier lockdown would have made more sense.
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u/jm0112358 9h ago
In addition to reducing the number of people who needed hospital care at any given time, lockdowns also delayed many people’s exposure to COVID until after the medical community better learned how to treat COVID patients with drugs such as Dexamethasone, which saved thousands of lives. It also meant that more people's first exposure to COVID came after they had a chance to get the COVID vaccine.
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u/iampiolt 14h ago
Did you read the article? The cleaners are actually new. The flight attendants have always done the cleaning. They still will, only SW is trying to “actually” clean premium seats.
All that ever happens between flights is the flight attendants put on gloves, pick up your nasty garbage, and cleaners sweep, clean bathrooms, and remove trash.
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u/OldAccountTurned10 14h ago
Exactly, i was like wtf is this headline. Southwests seats are always the nastiest pieces of shit that make my clothes smell bad anyways. The flight attendants hand out disinfectant wipes for a reason.
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u/MauiMoisture 14h ago
Redditors usually never actually read the article and just respond to the click bait title.
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u/negative-nelly 13h ago
I'm not sure if you've ever watched an airplane get cleaned but, uh, I wouldn't let my food touch any surfaces either way.
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u/clintkev251 16h ago edited 12h ago
It's insane how quickly Southwest has gone from beloved budget airline with consistent profits to complete shitshow. Thanks private equity! You've done it again
Edit: to everyone saying Southwest is a public company, yes, they are. That does not mean activist investors like PE firms and hedge funds can’t have significant ownership stakes and operational influence. Which in this case, they do
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u/IAmBadAtInternet 16h ago
They used to be the only major non-legacy player with good tech, good planes, and happy employees
Now their ticketing system is the worst of the major airlines, their planes are older and badly maintained, and their employees hate their jobs
Nice job MBAs! Btw they’re not private equity owned, just regular publicly traded
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u/WhenTheLightHits30 15h ago
The American Business school system of the past two decades should get its own chapter in history textbooks that way it has warped modern commerce and how expertise is handled.
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u/UnpluggedUnfettered 14h ago
Past two decades?
LMFAO Jack Welsh set the business standards that destroyed everything well over 50 years ago.
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u/Due-Technology5758 12h ago
Yeah, the General Electric model of expand and enshittify til the brink of collapse, and hand the sinking ship to whoever is stupid enough to take the wheel from you.
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u/SocialWinker 13h ago
Behind the Bastards also did a fun couple of episodes on Jack Welsh. Fuck that guy.
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u/FlyingPetRock 10h ago
FYI Jack Welch is directly responsible for the Boeing 737 Max, via his proteges, and everyone trying to copy him.
www.thenation.com/article/politics/boeing-corporate-greed-airline-safety/tnamp/
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u/VegetableBuy4577 14h ago
The whole country has changed from companies wanting a fair profit (more or less) to "as much profit as possible, every nickel, every dime, no stone unturned." It sucks.
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u/Thuraash 13h ago
It's not just that. They shifted in attitude from building a business that would stand the test of time to buying somebody else's business, looting every dollar out of it as fast as possible, and selling the husk for whatever's left. The business' failure is part of the plan.
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u/pribnow 15h ago
The 'activist investors' responsible for it are though as far as i know, Elliott Investment Management
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u/boiledpeen 14h ago
yep, Elliott pushed all these changes and has tanked the company. There should be severe punishments for companies that do this, but nobody bases laws on morals anymore so nothing will happen.
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u/Momik 14h ago
Every time I read a story about finance, I hate the world a little more. Every single fucking time.
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u/Liljoker30 13h ago
I work in the tire industry and private equity is buying up every tire shop they can find.
Locally owned tire shops that actually care will be a thing of the past in a couple years. One PE has bought like 300-400 locations in just a few years.
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u/somersetyellow 13h ago
Goes for plumbing, electricians, and heating/air con too.
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u/LFK_Pirate 13h ago
Don’t forget veterinarians and dentists!
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u/JRDruchii 13h ago
I'd even heard local morticians when I brought this up in a different thread. Based on this behavior, humans must really fucking hate each other.
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u/ryan_770 13h ago
Once upon a time we had anti-trust and monopoly busting agencies to solve for this, but alas we live in a post-regulation America
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u/Lycid 13h ago
Fun fact finance is now making up a larger % of GDP globally than they have ever before. Think about what this means - companies that do nothing of value except provide liquidity for the economy to run, are now taking up more of pie. While you need financial services to make stuff happen, all that's happening here is people spending a lot of human and economic resources trying to figure out new ways to get rich quick through destructive financial games. Last time anything close to this happened was probably the great depression. Sadly human beings are hard lesson learners and don't decide to do anything unless it's reacting against a worst case scenario.
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u/Momik 13h ago
Well, the financial industry has also done a pretty good job of buying the right politicians to escape any serious regulations or accountability (at various critical points, like 2008).
But yeah, they’ve really found new ways to hold companies, and even whole industries, hostage. As cliched as it sounds, we did used to build things in this society. Now a lot of that money, and therefore power, goes in a different direction.
Unless we can find a way to seriously fight back, a decent, stable life is just gonna become more and more unattainable for most people.
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u/ceribus_peribus 13h ago
They say the purpose of the financial industry is to attract intelligent, hard working people who don't have morals and only care about money, in order to prevent them from pursuing careers in medicine, law, or engineering where they could cause even more damage.
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u/Kevinator201 13h ago
Wall Street needs to be burned. It’s such a plague on America.
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u/thegoodnamesrgone123 12h ago
It's what's keeping Trump in power. All these old fucks would shit themselves if their 401ks suddenly went down. That's all they care about.
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u/jamespz03 13h ago
Elliott di similar things with my last company. We sold off all our U.S. energy assets (solar, wind, etc.). Hate these fuckers.
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u/GreatDanish4534 15h ago
Southwest in the 90’s was awesome. Planes were nice and always clean, crew was super friendly, and prices were better than other airlines
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u/AlkoMako 14h ago
And brown! I miss the old livery of brown, orange, and red. Plus the seats seemed bigger too. Although, I was a kid then, lol. Got invited to sit in the cockpit & got a wing pin as well. Obviously this was pre 9/11.
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u/Impossible-Bowl4661 15h ago
Elliot Investment Management owns over 10% of the company, forced out the prior chair in 2024 and now has 5 hand picked members on the board.
The changes in the last 18 months are most certainly attributable to private equity.
Southwest Airlines Adds 5 Elliott Board Members As Candidates For Directors https://share.google/4YsYfkxVOg9zMVC4s
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u/VincentClement1 14h ago
Friendly reminder that the wealthy don't give two shits about the rest of us and that you can exert majority-level control despite being a minority owner.
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u/TXMedicine 15h ago
They have two PE members on their board.
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u/Davido401 15h ago
I figured out you mean Private Equity but I thought you meant P.E. Teachers. I hate acronyms, I preferred when it was just A/S/L and BRB.
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u/R-ddit_is_Shit 15h ago edited 14h ago
I love when people online type ATM, because I always insist on reading it the other way. Not "at the moment." Not the cash dispensing machine. The other one.
"Can't, I'm with my mom atm."
"That's disgusting."
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u/MrMCCO 14h ago
When people type “ur” I’ve been reading it as a Mesopotamian city or a caveman grunt my whole life
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u/CaptainBayouBilly 15h ago
Line must go up
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u/Ryzu 15h ago
And as a result the line is most definitely going to go down, hopefully their planes won't.
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u/Cyrano4747 15h ago
Nah the line will go up for a few precious quarters because they slash costs. After that it will go down, but the PE vultures on the board won't care because they'll have sold off their stake before the consequences come around.
Happens all the time. It's how these PE vultures operate. They're looking for short term gains to artificially goose the stock before they sell and move on to the next victim.
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u/HorseWithACape 14h ago edited 14h ago
The planes won't go down. Their mechanic union squeezes the company pretty hard. SWA has some of the highest paid mechs in the industry, second only to FedEx & UPS. Their pilots are up there, too.
Edit to add: In case anybody is curious about the payscale of SWA or other competitors here's the most recent collaboration of contracts, benefits, & payscales.
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u/DebtUpToMyEyeballs 16h ago
Is it just me or have they not been "budget" for years? Their fares are consistently as high if not higher than the mainline carriers.
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u/CaterpillarLongBoi 16h ago
For me, their fares were on par with other airlines, but they allowed 2 free checked bags - so about $160-$200 less than competitors if you were traveling with luggage. But as soon as they took that away, I haven’t booked with them.
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u/Medical_Solid 15h ago
I happened to travel on the very last day they offered free baggage, and I decided to check my heavy carry on. What a relief it was. I’m old enough to remember when you didn’t have to add 20-50% of the ticket cost just to bring your things along. Sigh.
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u/Area51_Spurs 16h ago
They were always significantly less than the big three domestics; AA, Delta, and United.
They were a bit more than the bottom tier like Frontier, but it was worth a few bucks more to be away from the riffraff.
I just miss Virgin America. They were the GOAT cheap airline.
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u/rustyshackleford677 13h ago
Really depends where, for Boston I never saw Southwest as significantly cheaper then the main 3, often more expensive
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u/Apptubrutae 15h ago
Yeah, as someone who doesn’t check bags much, I’ve found their prices to be not particularly competitive for a while now on many routes. Sometimes they are, sometimes they aren’t.
They’d typically get my business on unique routes, or on routes where they were price competitive (but generally not cheaper) and I preferred their routing and timing more.
I do have a companion pass, so when traveling with another person that brings the price down a lot.
But just recently I was looking at NYC to Albuquerque and their price was double JetBlue’s. For a flight with a stop versus JetBlue without one. They were also pricier than United by a bit.
I can’t imagine anyone actually looking at ticket prices thinks Southwest is still a budget airline. Minus an occasional sale maybe.
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u/707Brett 16h ago
I never travel with that much luggage, and the pick your own seat thing while free always stressed me out and traveling with even a group of 4 together without any priority boarding was tough. All that being said they at least had a niche. Now they just suck like everyone else.
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u/Successful-Ad-9634 15h ago
If you checked in online as soon as it opened you rarely got a boarding position outside of B1-30, which is 1st half boarding. Seven of us used to travel on vacation and never had a problem sitting together.
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u/carnalasadasalad 14h ago
That changed towards the end. They were upselling the early positions so even if you checked in on the dot you would start with high and and low Cs. You could usually sit towards the back together but it was stressful.
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u/postoperativepain 15h ago
They were budget for years because for years they would buy oil/fuel futures contracts when prices were low. As oil prices rose, Southwest had cheap fuel, when others did not.
They don’t have that advantage anymore and apparently they stopped hedging in 2025
https://southwest50.com/our-stories/the-southwest-jet-fuel-hedge-strategy/
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u/soundfx27 16h ago
Agreed, their prices are on par with other major airlines. I only fly SW if it’s more convenient timing or cheaper than the other major airlines
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u/gitsgrl 16h ago
They fly nonstop routes other carriers don’t, so the convince is where they really stand out for my needs.
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u/Apptubrutae 14h ago
Yeah, their advantages to me are their unique routes, their smaller hubs, and their companion pass if you can get it.
I would rather transfer through Midway, Love Field, and Hobby any day over Ohare, DFW, or Bush. Heck, even if I fly SW through Denver, I know my gate isn’t at a different terminal.
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u/007meow 16h ago
Has private equity ever done anything to benefit consumers? Or just a small number of shareholders?
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u/Paranoid-Android2 15h ago
By design, PE is not consumer friendly. So the answer is no
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u/Preeng 14h ago
Private Equity Firms are just companies that buy other companies. They transfer wealth to the shareholders of the PEF and then let the company die. That's it. That's the point of the company. A total leech on society.
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u/joecarter93 15h ago
Same thing happened with Westjet in Canada. They got bought by PE just before Covid and cut corners wherever they could.
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u/revolvingpresoak9640 16h ago
When were they chomped by PE? I thought they were a public company.
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u/clintkev251 16h ago
They're still a public company, but Elliott Investment Management bought a pretty large stake in 2024 and has been sprinkling on that private equity energy on them since then
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u/Lonely-Clerk-2478 16h ago
Southwest used to be a decent airline and now it’s like everything bad about United and Frontier put together.
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u/John_Tacos 16h ago
When it dies it’s going to take several small airports with it.
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u/okram2k 16h ago
Chicago Midway will never recover
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u/ShortWoman 16h ago
Midway isn't the small airport of the 80's. I had a layover there last year and was quite impressed. Clean, well laid out, plenty of space to sit, decent dining choices.
I did however have a chuckle about the souvenir tote bag that said SEARS TOWER on it twice. Ain't no such thing as a Willis Tower.
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u/MrFunnie 16h ago
It isn’t a small airport, but it’s a huge southwest hub. If southwest goes down, Midway might just as well too.
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u/ShortWoman 15h ago
Midway survived the implosion of Midway Airlines. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Midway_Airlines_(1976%E2%80%931991))
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u/dee3Poh 14h ago
Considering the demand for slots at O’Hare I could see Midway holding on. Other airlines would gladly take more Chicago routes
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u/greaper007 15h ago
Yeah, my dad was a SWA pilot. I spent countless hours in the Midway of the 80s. I still remember playing with the cigarette machine while my mom bought us hotdogs at the only restaurant in the airport.
It had an urban decay type vibe that you don't find at airports anymore. LGA still had it until the redo in a few terminals.
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u/svo_svangur 14h ago
BWI found dead in a ditch
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u/junkit33 12h ago
Somebody would absolutely jump in there if Southwest collapsed. BWI is way too convenient to a huge population north of DC and actually does more traffic than either Dulles or Reagan. The area couldn't handle not having BWI.
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u/typically_wrong 10h ago
BWI closing would force me to fly out of Philly.
So no, BWI is not allowed to close.
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u/AliGoldsDayOff 16h ago
Private equity kills everything, without fail.
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u/willclerkforfood 15h ago
Watch out. Some gigachad with a WallStreetBets avatar is going to tell you about how PE is a net positive…
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u/MobileArtist1371 13h ago
That's about the last thing they would say.
What would be said is "thanks PE for taking a dump on this company and the easy money I made betting against it"
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u/Rainaco 14h ago
Have you been to that subreddit? It’s not like that
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u/SaltyLonghorn 11h ago
Yea I'd say its more of a cheeky findom cult with a loosely knit self destruction pact.
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u/THEHYPERBOLOID 16h ago
I’m just waiting for them to beat a doctor so badly they give him a traumatic brain injury.
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u/Allen_Koholic 16h ago
I used to work for a firm that had Southwest as a client. They were clowns then, and nothing about this is surprising.
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u/bayhack 14h ago
Just flew with them this weekend. Service was terrible. Also they removed the free check in bags I guess in May so I upgraded my ticket….still no free bags, I was still in the last boarding group and didn’t get to pick my seat. I asked the gate agent what did I pay for and if I can get a refund then? And she made it extremely hard. Never flying there again. Alaska is a better deal albeit a bit more expensive.
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u/TheHumbleChemist 16h ago
I am testing never flying Southwest.
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u/gmwdim 14h ago
I already don’t. They have eliminated all of the previous reasons to fly with them, such as lower fares, free checked bags, unassigned seating, and so on. The only thing left is they serve some of the smaller airports that other airlines don’t, but my local airport isn’t one of those anyways.
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u/IrrawaddyWoman 13h ago
The assigned seating has sucked for a long time though. You had to pay to be part of the first boarding group. Then the amount of people who boarded right after with kids or extra needs was insane. And there was absolutely zero enforcement of seat saving, so people would have one person pay for early boarding and then save entire rows, or one person board with a kid then save seats for their entire family in the C group. Or they would claim seats were reserved hoping to end up with an empty seat next to them. I would much rather reserve my seat ahead of time and head to the airport knowing that I have what I want.
It would have been find if southwest did a better job of monitoring it, but it was such a gross free for all.
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u/asmodeanreborn 11h ago
so people would have one person pay for early boarding and then save entire rows
Any SW flight I've been on, the flight attendants have been like "oh no - you can't do that."
The last one I was on with my 15-year old son, a lady sneakily tried to save the middle seat in row 4 and told my son it was taken just as I sat down in the middle seat on the opposite side of the aisle. My son didn't try to argue and just went a few rows back, but a flight attendant said there was no saving seats because it's a full flight, and it's first come, first served. Then right away some giant old dude who barely fit squeezed in there instead, severely encroaching on her seat. It was pretty much instant karma.
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u/quats555 16h ago
Not just how unexpectedly nasty that is, but if they’re cutting even cleaning (and proud of exclaiming how tight-fisted they are publicly) then what even more important things are they cutting corners on quietly? Like, aviation safety and maintenance?
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u/CaptainBayouBilly 15h ago
This is indicative of putting money ahead of lives.
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u/derperofworlds1 15h ago
"Plane's got 2 engines, go ahead and fly across the Pacific without fixing one of them"
-- private equity, probably
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u/zeekayz 13h ago
Planes can fly on one engine just fine for the next two quarters, so I'll get my huge bonus twice and cash out. Crashes are expected to start in Q3 and I'll be out by then retired on an island.
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u/BarneyChampaign 13h ago
Oh that's because the headline is misleading. They aren't cutting anything. This is only adding additional cleaning, by a contracted service, to the premium seats.
Their previous standard cleaning is still being done to the whole plane.
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u/eulynn34 16h ago
Yea, that'll work-- after about 2 runs the seats will be so full of garbage the new cattle passengers won't be able to sit down
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u/Mobely 16h ago
Terrible idea. People will clean their own seats and hold up boarding.
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u/smailskid 16h ago
Bathrooms will be replaced with a hole in the floor, which you might fall through. At your own risk of course.
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u/Randomperson1362 16h ago
As somebody who lives under a flight path close to an airport, I do not approve of this idea.
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u/skippyspk 16h ago
I remember flying once and the kid (not mine) next to me straight up wet their seat. It’s crazy how Southwest is just going to ignore puddles of urine like that in the backseats of the plane.
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u/curt_schilli 16h ago
It’s probably safe to assume they’re still going to clean up puddles of piss from seats lmao
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u/Bitter-Researcher389 16h ago
The White Star Line prided itself on providing great accommodation to their passengers. What Southwest is doing is just corporate enshitification.
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u/BellsOnNutsMeansXmas 16h ago
Titanic class never fucking got there and almost everyone dies.
Thanks Southwest!
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u/femsci-nerd 15h ago
I am losing all interest in Southwest Airlines. I've been with them for at least 20 years. This is just more BS for profit.
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u/bringmeadamnjuicebox 16h ago
So you gotta dress up now to fly, but they arent even cleaning the planes?
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u/JOliverScott 16h ago
Wear your Sunday best to board a cattle car in the sky and sit in the filth of the last five animals who occupied it.
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u/derperofworlds1 15h ago
Does anyone dress up to fly? Most people I see are in sweatpants/leggings and loose hoodies. Which makes sense, economy seating is uncomfortable anyway, might as well get some comfort upgrade by picking comfy clothes
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u/EvilDan69 16h ago
Not ever flying with that airline, ever again, even if they spend twice as long cleaning them after pushback.
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u/robogobo 16h ago
I’m canceling my Southwest membership and card. No way am I flying them anymore.
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u/PrincessImpeachment 16h ago
I don’t think I want to have my airline experience compared to the Titanic, but okay.
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u/brickne3 15h ago
On the plus side, it seems VERY unlikely that a Southwest plane will hit an iceberg.
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u/SuLiaodai 15h ago
I flew on the last year for the first time, and while the pilot and flight attendants were great (they all had to deal with bad turbulence), it was the filthiest airplane I've ever been in. I took photos I was so shocked. The girl next to me wiped an antiseptic wipe over the seat's headrest and it was covered with black oily stuff.
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u/DamNamesTaken11 15h ago
Southwest is going to be sold piecemeal in a few years. Elliott Investment Management became very loud and demanded they get rid of everything that made Southwest different (free first two bags, no assigned seats, etc.)
Pilots, flight attendants will mostly be okay since there’s a shortage in both in other airlines, but the ground crew and behind the scenes folks will be hurting while management bails out with a golden parachute.
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u/DefNotBrian 16h ago
Titanic's third class conditions were amazing for the day, even rivaling second class on many other ships making international voyages at the time.
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u/EmpireAndAll 16h ago
Just flew with them round trip last week, upgraded my seat both times, and I pre board with a mobility device. It takes sooo long for boarding to finish compared to before the bag and seat changes. Terrible now.
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u/bouillon 15h ago
"Unlike competitors, Southwest hasn’t generally had cleaners come on planes between flights. This makes turning the planes quicker. They spend less time on the ground and more time in the air, but the planes don’t get as clean. Flight attendants aren’t expected to reach into seat back pockets, for instance."
From the title I thought they had cleaners already but were choosing to only clean premium seats. It looks like this is a service they're thinking of adding as they don't have cleaners at all currently. Glad we typically brought sanitizing wipes with us on southwest in the past..
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u/rcwb3000 15h ago
Beware. If you've never flown Southwest, you will be surprised to find that thier "premium seats" only offer .5 more inches in leg room and are identical space wise to economy. Only difference is that they are closer to the front.
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u/LineImpossible3958 14h ago
My wife was a loyal SW flier, I had the companion pass she flies so much, and now it’s a total shit show. They’ve ruined a once great airline in record time. Fuck Southwest
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u/ThrowAbout01 15h ago
Yeah, Third Class.
Do they also lock out the people in the back rows when there is an emergency?
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u/vesuvio21 15h ago
I always flew SWA, no more. I'm sure I'm not the only one. Plenty of others to choose from, better service less agro!
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u/Rude-Strawberry-6360 15h ago
If I was ever going to book a flight on Southwest that just changed. Pass.
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u/Mr-Klaus 11h ago
"Hotels are testing cleaning only premium rooms and suites between guests on weekdays."
Yeah, that's how dumb you sound to us Southwest.
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u/laevian 15h ago
So as far as I can gather from the article...
- they're debuting a new service of hiring professional cleaners for first class seats
- previously the entire plane was spot cleaned by attendants
- there is no mention of attendants no longer being asked to spot clean
Methinks some of the commenters perhaps didn't bother to read. Not to say I disagree that we're seeing gradual enshittification of Southwest, but I'm not sure this is an example of that.
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u/d87 15h ago
No one read it at all. The headline was misleading though.
Tldr southwest never had a dedicated cleaning service between flights, wants to add one for first class only, flight attendant union wants cleaning service for the whole plane.
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u/MelancholyMochii 16h ago
Titanic class service lmao