Good news for at least one airline
Sanebull on High oil prices and lousy weather… were no problem for Delta Air Lines. Much to everyone’s delight, the airline overcame these obstacles by hiking fares. And, somehow, the company managed to sell more seats on its plane in the third quarter.
But can you blame them… because airline fuel cost the airline $655 million more compared to the same quarter last year. Fuel prices were up 37% and to add to that, Hurricane Florence cost the company another $30 million. Despite these obstacles, Delta’s profit was up $127 million for the quarter.
The details on how they did it… passengers paid an average of 4% more to fly per mile. The increase alone gave sales an $892 million bump which more than covered the fuel costs. Delta is the first airline to report its third-quarter earnings, and the result is a good one for investors (but not so much for passengers).
