STRATEGIES OF CHALLENGING AIRLINES AT HUB-DOMINATED AIRPORTS

The issue of dominated hubs in the U.S. airline industry has gained exceptional exposure in academic journals, new periodicals, and even the U.S. Congress. While this attention has focused on the public policy implications of reduced competition at these airports, insufficient consideration has been given to the management question of how other airlines can compete successfully at airports dominated by one airline. This paper addresses the competitive challenge of operating at dominated hubs by using historical airline operating data from the third quarter 1987, as collected by the U.S. Government. The data sources used permit collection of route specific data broken down by the operating carrier. Since all airlines find they are a challenger in other airlines' hubs, this effort contributes to management knowledge by identifying a set of challenger strategies or tactics that have been demonstrated to be related in a significant and positive way to challenger performance in markets from another airline's hub. Some highlights of the empirical analysis are that competing carriers can find routes from a dominated hub where the leader does not operate direct service. The routes that minimize competition with other carriers produce superior challenger performance. Providing frequent service and achieving high market shares are key strategies on routes from dominated hubs. Flying to a challenger's own hub and slot restricted airports is associated with routes that have strong performance.

• Record URL:
  • https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/001070572/Home
• Availability:
  • Find a library where document is available. Order URL: http://worldcat.org/issn/10461469
• Corporate Authors:

  Transportation Research Forum

  1600 Wilson Boulevard, Suite 905
  Arlington, VA  United States  22209
• Authors:
  • Kling, J A
  • Grimm, C M
  • Corsi, T M
• Publication Date: 1991

Media Info

• Features: Figures; References; Tables;
• Pagination: p. 359-370
• Serial:
  • Journal of the Transportation Research Forum
  • Volume: 31
  • Issue Number: 2
  • Publisher: Transportation Research Forum
  • ISSN: 1046-1469
  • Serial URL: https://trforum.org/journal-of-the-trf/
• Publication flags:

  Open Access (libre)

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Airlines; Competition; Data analysis; Hub and spoke systems; Management; Market share; Mathematical analysis; Performance; Schedules
• Uncontrolled Terms: Service frequency
• Geographic Terms: United States
• Old TRIS Terms: Strategy
• Subject Areas: Administration and Management; Aviation; Economics; Highways; Society;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 00610191
• Record Type: Publication
• Report/Paper Numbers: HS-041 177
• Files: TRIS
• Created Date: Jun 30 1991 12:00AM