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It's a great article about something I've wanted to write about for a long time. I've been wondering why the airlines worked so hard to kill any differentiation and commoditize their business. The experience today is really similar on all airlines, with parts of it being exactly the same, outsourced away (ground handling, gates, security, lost luggage handling, etc).

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They worked hard to commoditize because that's what customers wanted. I had a great experience flying Porter last Monday, but I'm not going to pay $30 extra on my next flight just for free beer and terra chips.

The only thing I'd pay extra for is an exit row seat and I'm a special case (most people are not 6'5").

I agree, every bit of the airline experience is being outsourced to the lowest bidder (from flying the planes down to fixing them). It's all too easy to purchase a ticket and never talk to any of the parent airline's employees but you'd never know. In some cases this is good and while in some cases, not so much.

IMO, most of the airlines don't want employees or to control a brand they just want to sell tickets.

Thats why the good LCC are very good (Southwestern, Virgin America, Westjet) - they do have good employees

When the majors play at being LCC by outsourcing everything to outfits with a single regional jet it's terrible.

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