• Please take a moment and update your account profile. If you have an updated account profile with basic information on why you are on Air Warriors it will help other people respond to your posts. How do you update your profile you ask?

    Go here:

    Edit Account Details and Profile

The SHOW: Airlines still a "good gig"??

Jim123

DD-214 in hand and I'm gonna party like it's 1998
pilot
It's easier for Bezos to keep those pilots paid less that way. If he brings them into the Amazon house as their own cargo airline, industry standard for widebody cargo is Purple/UPS pay rates. Cheaper to just whipsaw ATI and Atlas labor against one another.
Truth, though the whipsaw is tough with only two competing companies- critical mass seems to be at least three.
 

Python

Well-Known Member
pilot
Contributor
Amazon runs Prime Air with a mixture of leased and owned aircraft. They own Prime Air but they contract out the flying to either Atlas or ATI. The aircraft operate under the those carrier's certificates. Prime Air is for moving and delivering Amazon products and orders, they are not an effort to compete with FedEx or UPS.

I’m aware of that much. In interpreting the articles as saying that Amazon is shifting to owning their own airplanes outright, with this first purchase.
 

wink

War Hoover NFO.
None
Super Moderator
Contributor
Amazon runs Prime Air with a mixture of leased and owned aircraft. They own Prime Air but they contract out the flying to either Atlas or ATI. The aircraft operate under the those carrier's certificates. Prime Air is for moving and delivering Amazon products and orders, they are not an effort to compete with FedEx or UPS.
Except that every package Amazon moves through Prime Air, Atlas, or ATI is a package UPS or Fedex will not carry. The market is carrying freight/packages. Amazons own air force is competition in the market.
 

scoolbubba

Brett327 gargles ballsacks
pilot
Contributor
FedEx and UPS were moving high volume/low margin stuff. When lift is the limiting factor, why waste it on mostly cardboard and air?
 

wink

War Hoover NFO.
None
Super Moderator
Contributor
FedEx and UPS were moving high volume/low margin stuff. When lift is the limiting factor, why waste it on mostly cardboard and air?
I don't really know the freight business, but I know dimensions are taken into account. I remember back in the day, AA nearly paid for the gas for a DC10 to fly from HI to LA on fresh cut flowers in cargo on pax flights. Would cube out far before grossing out and made money no problem. There are smart guys at HQ who sometimes earn their keep.
 

scoolbubba

Brett327 gargles ballsacks
pilot
Contributor
There are smart guys at HQ who sometimes earn their keep.

I'll defer to Fred Smith. He's got a decent track record.

I think it was wise to ditch Amazon. They weren't making much profit on the stuff they were moving precisely because they were cubing out, and not subsidizing Amazon while it was apparent that they were building out their own potentially competing network was worth the short term pain of lost revenue after cutting the apron strings. We'll know if it was the right move in 30 years.

I'm kind of hoping Jeff Bezos learns the old cliche about making small fortunes out of large ones with an airline.
 

Griz882

Frightening children with the Griz-O-Copter!
pilot
Contributor
I don't really know the freight business, but I know dimensions are taken into account. I remember back in the day, AA nearly paid for the gas for a DC10 to fly from HI to LA on fresh cut flowers in cargo on pax flights. Would cube out far before grossing out and made money no problem. There are smart guys at HQ who sometimes earn their keep.
I always thought cargo subsidized the lower passenger fares.
 

FrankTheTank

Professional Pot Stirrer
pilot
Except that every package Amazon moves through Prime Air, Atlas, or ATI is a package UPS or Fedex will not carry. The market is carrying freight/packages. Amazons own air force is competition in the market.
Let them carry all their low margin trinkets all over the country. I prefer fedex sticks with quality over quantity!
 

FrankTheTank

Professional Pot Stirrer
pilot
I don't really know the freight business, but I know dimensions are taken into account. I remember back in the day, AA nearly paid for the gas for a DC10 to fly from HI to LA on fresh cut flowers in cargo on pax flights. Would cube out far before grossing out and made money no problem. There are smart guys at HQ who sometimes earn their keep.
I love “flower” flights. The airplane has never smelled so good. And neither has the FLL ramp for that matter..?
 

FrankTheTank

Professional Pot Stirrer
pilot
I'll defer to Fred Smith. He's got a decent track record.

I think it was wise to ditch Amazon. They weren't making much profit on the stuff they were moving precisely because they were cubing out, and not subsidizing Amazon while it was apparent that they were building out their own potentially competing network was worth the short term pain of lost revenue after cutting the apron strings. We'll know if it was the right move in 30 years.

I'm kind of hoping Jeff Bezos learns the old cliche about making small fortunes out of large ones with an airline.
Amazon was fucking us.. Ask any Ramp Manager. They would add freight and “Amazon” flights and then last minute cancel. Cost us in lost cargo capacity and flight cancellations. And most of them were long and high paying parings.
 

wink

War Hoover NFO.
None
Super Moderator
Contributor
It appears Amazon was not will to pay what FedEx wanted given how they stiffed FedEx over and over. That's business.
 

Python

Well-Known Member
pilot
Contributor

From the article. Seems like Amazon has more than just their own stuff in mind:



Amazon started a UPS-like parcel service in the U.K. last year, but abandoned a similar effort in the U.S. amid the surge in online orders. Much of Wall Street believes Amazon will eventually fly packages for other companies to defray investments in Amazon Air and generate new revenue streams, much the way it did with other logistics services and its cloud-computing division.

“I absolutely expect them to pick that up again,’’ says Ravi Shanker, a Morgan Stanley logistics and transportation analyst.

But for now, Amazon Air ships items already in its warehouses, typically bound for customers.
 
Top