Spirit Airlines Executive Says Competitors Trying to Put Carrier ‘Out of Business’

On the heels of United Airlines’ CEO predicting Spirit Airlines will liquidate, the struggling carrier is striking back.

During testimony Wednesday at a Senate subcommittee hearing related to airline fees, Spirit’s Chief Commercial Officer, Matthew Klein said other airlines are actively attempting to "put [Spirit] out of business."

Earlier this week, the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Subcommittee on Permanent Investigations grilled executives from several airlines about perceived junk fees.

Klein’s comments came during that hearing in response to questions from Committee Chairman Sen. Richard Blumenthal, who asked the CCO to  share some thoughts regarding the lack of competition and barriers to entry in the airline industry, according to Airline Geeks.

The Spirit CCO had plenty of thoughts to share. He pointed out that for quite some time the budget carrier has not had access to certain airports. On top of that, Klein said Spirit is also limited by being given gates that are located at the furthest ends of airports.

“...[It] makes it very difficult to provide a good guest experience,” Klein told the committee, per Airline Geeks. “It makes it very difficult for us to be able to operate efficiently and effectively. It raises our costs, which then, of course, makes it harder for us to be profitable – and without being profitable we certainly can’t grow.”

The CCO further added that Spirit’s Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing was evidence of these challenges. The government blocking Spirit's proposed merger with JetBlue earlier this year didn't help matters, further curtailing the carrier’s ability to thrive, said Klein.

“That prevented us from really reacting and being able to do a lot of things for a couple of years,” Klein said. “Now we’re trying. We’re trying to improve our guest experience.”

Before wrapping up his comments, Klein touched upon the fact that other airline CEOs appear to be eager for Spirit to fail and have made public comments along those lines.

“Some CEOs have said how they’re gunning for us, they’re trying to put us out of business, they just can’t wait for that to happen,” Klein continued.

Earlier this week, United CEO Scott Kirby predicted the struggling Spirit Airlines would not survive bankruptcy and would ultimately go out of business. Kirby also expressed criticism of Spirit’s business model. 

“I think the current business plan is not going to work and, if they pursue it, Chapter 11 will be a brief pit stop on the way to Chapter 7,” Kirby said at a recent event at Washington’s Dulles International Airport, according to Travel + Leisure.

Spirit’s plan for survival is focused on ramping up its revenue by offering new premium products and fare bundles. The plan does not focus as heavily on addressing the carrier's debt issues.

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