The company also introduced cargo service between the airports it served and by the end of 1973 had notched its first profitable year, carrying over half a million passengers. In 1973, Braniff Airlines began a fare war with Southwest over service from this airport to Dallas Southwest resorted to giveaways of liquor, leather ice buckets, and 50% discounts on fares. Hobby Airport, located much closer to the city ’s downtown, in an effort to become more convenient to commuters. In the following year, the company transferred its Houston service from Houston Intercontinental Airport to William P. Southwest made much of its scantily-clad women, whose pin-up-like images would eventually appear widely, including the cover of Esquire magazine.īy the end of 1971, Southwest owned four aircraft, offered hourly flights between Dallas and Houston, and had inaugurated service between San Antonio and Houston, completing the last leg of a triangular route. Flight attendants were dressed in hot pants and go-go boots to serve “love potions ” and “love bites ” (also known as drinks and peanuts) to the company ’s clientele of mostly male business fliers. One-way tickets cost $20.Ĭourting the commuter, the company stressed “no-frills ” convenience and, in reference to Love Field in Dallas, its home base, made “love ” its promotional theme. Lamar Muse, the airline offered six daily round-trip flights between Dallas and San Antonio, and twelve daily round-trip flights between Dallas and Houston. Six months later, after fighting numerous legal battles, changing its name to Southwest Air, and selling stock in the company, the fledgling airline began operations on June 18, 1971. Supreme Court, and in December of 1970 this court ruled in favor of Air Southwest. Kelleher, an attorney whose stake in the airline was a mere $20,000, took the case all the way to the U.S. Although the Texas Aeronautics Commission (TAC), the regulatory body responsible for overseeing aviation within the state, granted the company permission to fly the routes it had requested in February of 1968, three competing airlines filed suit to prevent the airline from getting off the ground. Incorporated in 1967, the company was envisioned as a commuter airline serving three cities within Texas: Dallas, Houston, and San Antonio. Kelleher, pooled $560,000 to form the Air Southwest Company. Southwest Air was founded in 1966 when a group of Texas investors, including Rollin King, M. With its unique operating philosophy, Southwest is a maverick in the airline industry. Despite complaints from travel agents, the airline eschews the use of a reservation system to avoid paying the required fees. The company flies only Boeing 737s, to simplify maintenance, and employee productivity is high: planes are turned around for their next flight in just 15 minutes, one-third the industry average. There is no reserved seating and boarding passes are re-used. For example, Southwest neither serves meals on board nor checks bags through to connecting flights. South-west ’s operating philosophy combines rock-bottom fares and no frills. The company sees its principal competition as the automobile rather than other airlines. Unique among American airlines in many ways, the company has enjoyed more than twenty years of steady growth by specializing in frequent nonstop flights that are less than two hours in duration. Southwest Airlines is the seventh largest American airline, serving cities in the Midwest, Southwest, and California.
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