00:00:00
Why airlines fly which plane where is
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mostly demand. Big planes fly to big
00:00:05
places, small planes fly to small
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places. But it's not all demand. An
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incredible nearly endless array of
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factors dictate the rest of it. While
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each airline is unique and how it
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decides which aircraft to fly. As an
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example, United Airlines has 28
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different aircraft variants. This is
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quite inefficient. You can tell it's
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inefficient because lowcost airlines
00:00:28
like Southwest and Ryionaire streamline
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their fleet down to one aircraft type.
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Each additional aircraft variant in a
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fleet adds very real cost through
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increased operational complexity.
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Maintenance costs more. Crewing is more
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complicated. Even airport operations get
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less efficient. So each of United's 28
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aircraft variants must somehow be
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justified. And perhaps the most
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convoluted justifications occur within
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the regionals. the very smallest
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aircraft in the airlines fleet. The
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composition of this subset is almost
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entirely dictated by section 1 C1 of
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United's fiercely negotiated collective
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bargaining agreement with the Airline
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Pilots Association, the union
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representing its pilots. This is what's
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referred to as the scope clause, and it
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essentially limits how much flying
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United can outsource to regional
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airlines. In the US, smaller aircraft
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are not technically operated by the
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major airlines whose name are on the
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aircraft, United, Delta, and American.
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Rather, they're operated on their behalf
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by regional airlines like Sky West,
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Envoy, and PSA. The unions don't love
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this because it's pretty overtly a way
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to circumvent the higher pay rates
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they've negotiated. The pilots and cabin
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crew at the regionals are typically
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either non-union or represented by
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weaker unions. While United, Delta, and
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American consistently have more
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bargaining power than with their own
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staff since they can respond to cost
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increases at one regional by shifting
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flying to another. So this manifests in
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dramatically lower pay scales. A
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firstear captain at Sky West, which
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flies United CRJ200s, 550s, 700s, and
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E175s, earns $141.40
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per flight hour. whereas a firstear
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captain at United mainline makes a
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minimum of $342.75
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for that same flight hour. So to protect
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their pay, United's collective
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bargaining agreement, which is quite
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similar to Delta and Americans, sets
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strict limits on how much flying the
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regionals can do. They're allowed
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unlimited flying on 37 seat turborops,
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although in practice, United hasn't
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flown turbo props since 2018. They're
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also allowed to operate as many 50 seat
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jets as they want so long as the total
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does not exceed 90% of that of the
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mainline single aisle fleet. In
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practice, this is effectively unlimited
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as the 50 seat jet total has never come
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even close to that of the single aisle
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fleet total. The most meaningful part of
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the scope clause is the next one. They
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can only fly up to 255 70 and 76 seat
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aircraft, of which no more than 153 can
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be 76 seats. Looking at United's fleet
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inventory, they fly exactly 255 70 and
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76 seat aircraft. This creates some
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rather bizarre fleet complexity. For
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example, United flies two different
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versions of its E175.
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One is outfitted with 76 seats, but of
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course, the airline is limited in how
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many 76 seat aircraft it can operate, so
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they also fly a 70 seat variant. It
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removes a row and a half of economy
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seats and uses the space to give
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everyone in economy an extra inch of
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legroom and add this luggage locker in
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the back. But this is only the start of
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artificial disfficiency for the sake of
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fulfilling union requirements. You see,
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Embraer, the manufacturer of the E175,
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has developed a second generation of the
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aircraft called the E175E2.
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This aircraft is quieter, more advanced,
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and dramatically more efficient thanks
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to its geared turboan engines. Fuel burn
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is an estimated 16 to 25% lower, but no
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US airline operates it. The problem is
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that the E2 variant has a max takeoff
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weight of 98,000 lb, and that's 13,000
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over the limit the collective bargaining
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agreement scope clause imposes upon its
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76 seat aircraft. But this goes yet
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further. One challenge of United's 50
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seat jets historically is that they did
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not have first class seats. They
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operated with an all economy
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configuration. Premium cabins are the
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most profitable part of the plane. So
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this left a lot of money on the table.
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But the scope clause prevented the
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airline from adding more of the higher
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capacity premium cabin laden regional
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jets to their fleet. So rather United
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worked with Bombardier to develop a
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brand new airplane. Technically, it's
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called the CRJ 550. And physically, it's
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pretty much just a CRJ700, but
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technically, according to the FAA, it is
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its own distinct aircraft model. What
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United and Bombardier essentially did
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was convert a 70 seat aircraft into one
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compliant with the Union's 50 seat
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regulations. Of course, they had to
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reduce the seat count by 20. So, they
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added four more first class seats, four
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more economy plus seats, then reduced
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the economy count from 48 to just 20.
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With the leftover space, they added
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luggage lockers, preventing the
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typically frequent gate checking of bags
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due to the CRJ's limited overhead bin
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space. They also added a walk-up snack
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bar, as the plane now legally could and
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would be staffed by a single flight
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attendant rather than the typical two on
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the CRJ700. But they'd be tasked with
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much more work than on a typical 50 seat
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jet due to the inclusion of a firstass
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cabin requiring more personalized
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service. But there's still the maximum
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takeoff weight component of the scope
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clause. For a 50 seat jet, that was set
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to 65,000 lbs. But the CRJ700 airframe
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is rated for 75,000. So for the CRJ 550,
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software artificially limits how much
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fuel it can take on to keep it under
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65,000 lb. So strangely, despite lighter
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passenger loads, the CRJ 550's range is
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lower than that of the heavier loaded
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CRJ700 despite being physically
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outfitted with the exact same fuel
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tanks. Now, whereas on the one hand,
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this increases United's per seat
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operating costs, on the other hand, it
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ups their competitiveness in smaller
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markets, their other 50 seat jets are
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not popular among passengers. The CRJ
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200 has even earned the nickname Satan's
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Chariot given its cramped conditions.
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So, while costs might be higher, so too
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might profitability given the addition
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of first class and a generally improved
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passenger experience. So, what's seen in
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practice is that the CRJ 2000 and E145s
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fly to small uncompetitive markets. In
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fact, they're the aircraft of choice for
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destinations where United has a monopoly
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like Cheyenne, Wyoming, Lincoln,
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Nebraska, and Fort Dodge, Iowa.
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Meanwhile, the CRJ 550 is suited for the
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most competitive markets with low enough
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demand to only justify regional jet
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service. In particular, it's what United
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uses for many midsize markets in the
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eastern half of the US where Delta and
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American also have a strong presence.
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So, while United might not necessarily
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be the largest carrier in St. Louis, for
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example, it has a decent shot at
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competing for the higher fair premium
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and business traveler market thanks to
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the CRJ 550. Meanwhile, the other
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regional jets, the CRJ700 and E175, fill
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in the middle, serving as the aircraft
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of choice for small to midsize markets
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with average passenger dynamics and
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demographics.
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But it's once one gets into these
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midsize markets that aircraft choice
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gets more complicated. That's largely
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down to the allimp important distinction
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of leisure verse business travel. You
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see, vacationers care first and foremost
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about price. Generalizing, they'll just
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pick the cheapest reasonable itinerary
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between their origin and destination on
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the day they want to depart. Business
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travelers, meanwhile, care far more
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about timing. They might have a meeting
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that ends at 2 p.m. Then they want the
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fastest itinerary leaving soon after
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that. They would not even consider
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staying an extra night. They want to get
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home. And since their company is paying
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for it, they don't care how much it'll
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cost. That's why airlines like United go
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way out of their way to appeal to the
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business traveler crowd. Even if they're
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not the majority of passengers, they
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generate far more profit per passenger
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than the vacationers since they book
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close to departure, pay for premium
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cabins, and fly more frequently. To
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appeal to them, the key is to offer a
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lot of frequencies to the destinations
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they're likely to fly to most, which
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goes on to dictate aircraft choice. The
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United routes of Chicago to Burlington,
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Vermont, and Newark to Pittsburgh have
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somewhat similar capacity. United
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operates 415 daily seats on the former
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and 556 on the latter, but there's not
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much business demand to and from
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Burlington. Not none, but the planes
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there are filled much more by people
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going on vacation, visiting family,
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attending a wedding, etc. Pittsburgh,
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meanwhile, has major hospitals,
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universities, corporate headquarters,
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and a burgeoning tech scene. It's a
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major business travel origin and
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destination. So, United takes a very
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different approach to serving these two
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destinations. Chicago to Burlington is
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served by a morning 737800, a midday
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E175, and an evening 737 Max 9 each day.
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Pittsburgh to Newark, however, is served
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by eight daily United flights on a mix
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of E175s and CRJ550s, allowing for
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flights about every 2 hours throughout
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the day. It's a bigger destination, but
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it's served by smaller planes. Of
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course, the biggest determinant of
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whether a destination should be served
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by regional or mainline jets is just
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demand. And it's when one gets into that
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next category that the distinction
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between aircraft gets increasingly
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muddled. United's conventional A320
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family aircraft serve pretty much the
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exact same role as its conventional 737
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family aircraft. They're both core
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narrowbody aircraft with very similar
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capacity and performance stats. There
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are few meaningful differences between
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the Boeing and Airbus aircraft
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themselves that justify having both. The
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fact United has both has more to do with
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the practicalities of running an
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airline. Incorporating a new aircraft
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type into a fleet has some very real
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costs. An airline has to build a new
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pilot roster certified for the aircraft.
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They have to hire mechanics trained on
00:10:06
the aircraft. They have to get their
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ground crews accustomed to its
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particularities. Therefore, if an
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airline only operates, say, A320
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aircraft, Airbus will note that they
00:10:15
really would prefer not to buy Boeing
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aircraft when it's time for a new order.
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Therefore, Airbus might think that it
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doesn't have to give them quite as much
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of a bargain to win the order. So, a
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mixed fleet strengthens the airlines
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negotiating position. It also allows for
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the greatest level of flexibility,
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especially because aircraft make their
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way into fleets plenty of different
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ways. Beyond just new purchases, some
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aircraft are leased. Some aircraft are
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bought secondhand. And with a mixed
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fleet, airlines can grow or shrink more
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on their own terms based on the market
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of the moment. If a major A320-based
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airline just went bankrupt and flooded
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the leasing market with supply, then
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having an A320 fleet allows an airline
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to grow at a lower cost. Although while
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there's little distinction between how
00:10:55
United uses its A320 family aircraft
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versus its 737 family ones, there is a
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distinction in operations between its
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conventional A320s and 737s versus the
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newer Max and Neo generations. The 737
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Maxes, for example, are about 15 to 20%
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more fuel efficient than the previous
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generation. So, the airline deploys them
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predominantly on longer distance routes.
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After all, the longer the flight, the
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higher the proportion of costs
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attributable to fuel costs, and
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therefore the more savings to be made
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from flying a more efficient aircraft.
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So, a huge chunk of the Max's flying is
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transcontinental flights, and it even
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serves a burgeoning niche role of flying
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even longer low demand routes like the
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7-hour flights from Anchorage to New
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York or New York to Funch, Portugal.
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Now, the logic would follow that just as
00:11:42
the conventional 737s and A320s are more
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or less interchangeable, so too would
00:11:47
the 737 Maxes with the A320 Neo family
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aircraft, Airbus's newer generation of
00:11:52
narrow bodies. But so far, that's not
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quite the case. The A321 Neo is now
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United's second highest capacity
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narrowbody aircraft with 200 seats, and
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it's essentially replacing its only
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larger single aisle, the 757300.
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In recent years, the 757300 has served
00:12:09
just a few very particular high demand
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purposes. Hub-tohub flights, Hawaii
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routes, Florida routes, and the one
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daily flight from Denver to Washington
00:12:18
National. That's DC's downtown airport,
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which has a perimeter rule typically
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restricting flights of this length, with
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limited exceptions, including this one
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daily flight. With each of these
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purposes, United wanted to deploy more
00:12:29
capacity on the route, but not quite
00:12:31
that of a widebody aircraft. So, the
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757300 was well suited. But the 757300
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is getting old. The airlines youngest
00:12:39
was built in 2003. The aircraft is no
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longer in production and it's quite
00:12:44
inefficient compared to newer generation
00:12:46
aircraft. So the A321 Neo is essentially
00:12:49
United's replacement for it. But in the
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long term, this new aircraft's role is
00:12:53
expected to go well beyond that. You
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see, United's executives are of the
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belief that the US air traffic system
00:12:59
will not grow in capacity anytime soon,
00:13:02
particularly in and around its key hubs.
00:13:05
Airports like Houston, New York, and
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Chicago are stretched to their limits in
00:13:09
terms of gates, runway, and air traffic
00:13:11
control capacity. And there's not a
00:13:12
whole lot of rest bit in sight. But of
00:13:14
course, an aircraft only ever takes one
00:13:16
gate, one landing slot, and one air
00:13:19
traffic controller, no matter if it's a
00:13:20
tiny CRJ 200 or a massive trip 7. So,
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United's strategy for growing along with
00:13:26
US air traffic demand is to simply make
00:13:28
its aircraft larger, and the A321 Neo is
00:13:31
a core part of that. The airline has
00:13:33
almost 200 on order from Airbus. And as
00:13:36
these enter the fleet, they're
00:13:37
dramatically pushing up the average
00:13:39
capacity of the airlines narrowbody
00:13:40
fleet. They also plan to incorporate
00:13:42
A321 XLRs, a longer range variant, and
00:13:46
outfit them with liflat premium cabin
00:13:48
seats to replace the 757200s, which
00:13:50
serve premium transcontinental and lower
00:13:52
demand long haul routes. The final
00:13:55
category of predominantly domestic
00:13:57
aircraft is a rather unique one. In
00:13:59
fact, United is the only US airline with
00:14:02
it. Essentially, the airline created a
00:14:04
subfleet of trip 77200 widebody aircraft
00:14:08
exclusively for domestic and
00:14:09
international short hall use. These two
00:14:12
dozen aircraft are ancient. The fleet
00:14:14
even includes the oldest 77 still flying
00:14:16
for any airline, N774UA,
00:14:19
built in 1994. They're outfitted with an
00:14:22
incredibly dense configuration of 336
00:14:25
economy seats devoid of seatback
00:14:27
screens, plus 28 premium cabin seats.
00:14:29
Not even from the last generation of
00:14:31
United Liflat seats, but the one before
00:14:34
that. In fact, these aircraft are so
00:14:36
dense that they're actually the airlines
00:14:38
highest capacity planes. That's to say,
00:14:41
United simply does not care about the
00:14:43
onboard experience on these wide bodies.
00:14:45
While it might be deeply uncompetitive
00:14:47
for long haul flights, it's similar to
00:14:49
the onboard experience of the narrowbody
00:14:51
planes that typically do the same type
00:14:52
of flying. After all, this trip 7
00:14:55
subfleet exclusively flies two types of
00:14:57
routes. The first is super high demand
00:15:00
hubto hub routes like Denver to Chicago,
00:15:02
Chicago to Los Angeles or Los Angeles to
00:15:05
DC. And the second is a small number of
00:15:07
super high demand leisure focused
00:15:09
destinations Cancun, Las Vegas and most
00:15:12
notably Hawaii. Now, much like this
00:15:15
domestic trip 77 subfleet, United's
00:15:17
International 767s are very, very old.
00:15:21
Most were built around 25 years ago.
00:15:24
This means they're some of the least
00:15:26
fuelefficient aircraft out there, and
00:15:28
operating costs are therefore quite
00:15:29
high. But there are some advantages to
00:15:32
this. The value of a 25-year-old 767 is
00:15:35
almost nothing in aircraft terms. These
00:15:38
aircraft sell on the used market for
00:15:40
single millions compared to hundreds of
00:15:43
millions for new Y bodies. So the
00:15:45
opportunity or lease cost of their
00:15:47
aircraft is super low, which means the
00:15:49
airline doesn't have to worry as much
00:15:51
about getting their money's worth. 767s
00:15:54
are perfect for surge capacity. They fly
00:15:56
a lot in the busy summer and a lot less
00:15:59
in the lower demand winter. The fact
00:16:01
that they sit idle doesn't matter much
00:16:03
since they cost so little. When they do
00:16:05
fly, United predominantly deploys them
00:16:07
on US East Coast to Europe flights since
00:16:09
these are some of the shortest long haul
00:16:11
flights in their network and often have
00:16:13
poor aircraft utilization compared to
00:16:15
other long haul routes as aircraft fly
00:16:17
overnight to Europe, sit around for a
00:16:19
few hours, fly back to the US, then sit
00:16:21
around even more until repeating. But
00:16:24
the airline has also split its 767 fleet
00:16:27
in two to capture even more revenue.
00:16:30
This is their high J configuration.
00:16:32
Essentially, it's a layout of the plane
00:16:34
with a super high ratio of premium to
00:16:37
nonpremium seats. 46 business class, 22
00:16:40
premium economy, 43 economy plus, and 56
00:16:44
economy. That makes for a total capacity
00:16:46
of just 167, less than the airlines
00:16:50
narrow body 737900s.
00:16:53
United therefore flies this
00:16:54
configuration to destinations with the
00:16:56
strongest premium demand, London, Nice,
00:16:59
Zurich, Geneva, etc. Meanwhile, the
00:17:02
traditional 767 configuration with 18
00:17:04
fewer business class seats but 36 more
00:17:07
overall flies to destinations with more
00:17:09
typical demand like Amsterdam, Dar,
00:17:11
Lima, and Rio. United appears to have
00:17:14
had fantastic foresight when rolling out
00:17:15
this configuration in 2019. As today,
00:17:18
while overall international demand has
00:17:20
more or less stagnated, premium demand
00:17:22
is surging and other airlines are
00:17:24
leaving revenue on the table by just not
00:17:26
having enough business class seats. Now,
00:17:29
the next category of aircraft, the 787,
00:17:32
flies the other side of the spectrum of
00:17:34
long haul routes. The Dreamliner is
00:17:36
extremely expensive to purchase or
00:17:38
lease, but is tremendously more fuel
00:17:40
efficient, about 30% on a per seat basis
00:17:43
in a similar configuration. So, while
00:17:45
the airline had to pay a lot to either
00:17:47
purchase or lease the planes, it can
00:17:49
make that back in fuel savings by just
00:17:51
flying them a ton. That's why aircraft
00:17:54
utilization is key. It's always tightly
00:17:57
scheduled with just 2 or 3 hours between
00:18:00
flights and also flies the airlines very
00:18:02
longest routes DC to Cape Town, San
00:18:04
Francisco to Singapore, Houston to
00:18:06
Sydney. It also works as a solution to
00:18:08
lower demand long haul routes that are
00:18:10
beyond the relatively short ideal
00:18:12
operating range of the 767, San
00:18:14
Francisco to Christurch or DC to Logos,
00:18:17
for example. But what both the 767 and
00:18:20
787 are not great for is cargo. Cargo is
00:18:24
responsible for a relatively modest
00:18:26
portion of United's overall revenue,
00:18:28
about 3%, but it can absolutely make or
00:18:30
break the economics of individual long
00:18:32
haul routes. The trip 7, particularly
00:18:35
its -300 ER variant, is by far the
00:18:38
highest capacity cargo hauler with room
00:18:40
for 44 loading containers. For this
00:18:42
reason, the aircraft is
00:18:44
disproportionately deployed on the
00:18:45
airlines Asian routes, where air cargo
00:18:47
demand is highest. The airline currently
00:18:49
serves Hong Kong four times a day with
00:18:52
two 787 flights from Los Angeles and two
00:18:54
trip 77s from San Francisco, which
00:18:56
likely is far more than they would if
00:18:58
not for air cargo. The destination's
00:19:01
demand has slowed since co and to fill
00:19:03
planes, United has to offer relatively
00:19:05
low fairs given the steep competition
00:19:07
from Asian airlines. But Hong Kong is a
00:19:09
major air cargo hub sitting right next
00:19:12
to China's manufacturing capital of
00:19:13
Shenzhen. And that likely justifies its
00:19:15
status as the airlines second highest
00:19:17
capacity Asian destination after Tokyo.
00:19:21
Fleet selection is so core to an
00:19:23
airlines business model that it almost
00:19:25
single-handedly explains it. United's
00:19:27
strategy is centered around the hybrid
00:19:28
of domestic and global connectivity with
00:19:31
service to both small towns and
00:19:32
far-flung capitals. That's different
00:19:34
from say Emirates which with its
00:19:36
widebody only fleets is about connecting
00:19:38
far-flung high demand destinations with
00:19:41
little consideration for small markets.
00:19:43
Then there's an airline like Ryionaire
00:19:45
with a massive 737on fleet focused on
00:19:48
reducing operating costs and only
00:19:50
serving destinations that can support
00:19:51
the cost-saving strategy it deploys. An
00:19:54
airline strategy is its fleet. And its
00:19:56
fleet is its strategy.
00:20:01
Now, I know when you're standing in the
00:20:02
razor aisle at the grocery store, you
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profits, not for actual goodness.
00:20:24
They're really the printers of the
00:20:25
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00:20:27
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00:20:44
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