The people who complain about overpriced airline fares are, ironically, the ones who I dread flying with. They’re the non-ff’s..

weatherdoofus replied to your post: praisethename replied to your post: Without…

Delta is a pretty nice ride. Even their Connection planes are better than the best US Airways Express plane.

Indeed! I don’t dread Delta Con flights, though I definitely don’t look forward to them.

SLC is, like, my second home airport. Been there 8 times in less than a year!

praisethename replied to your post: Without Song, Delta would probably be similar to…

Explain

Well for people who don’t know what Song is.. Song was an “airline within an airline” concept, run by Delta. It commenced ops in ‘03 and was folded back into Delta mainline in ‘06-7.

The basic initiative behind Song was to be more competitive against jetBlue on flights between Florida and the Northeast, though Song later spread to the West Coast. The Song product included a one-class all-leather cabin, free IFE, free snacks and drinks, and a generally “cheerier” attitude than mainline Delta at the time. It was basically Delta “Plus,” although it was considered a low-cost carrier.

Though many people see Song’s closure and re-absorption into Delta in 2006 as a failure I see it as a success. Prior to 2006, the Delta mainline fleet was vastly inferior to Song. Delta’s product was more inline with AA’s cabin, and worse than CO’s (at the time). Fast-forward to 2013, and you have a Delta mainline fleet which, in my eyes, is Song.

Delta was not a hip, friendly, or trendy airline in 2006 but now they definitely are. They learned from their Song experiment that passengers do enjoy perks like free IFE, leather seats, more legroom (now in the form of Economy Comfort) and that friendly “modern” crew are desirable. They also learned that premium passengers prefer a two-class cabin.. amongst other things. AA is just now starting to follow suit. UA was.. and then the merger with CO happened.

The Delta we have now isn’t the Delta from 7 years ago. Effectively the better parts of Delta, Song, and Northwest Airlines have all come together to form the airline I know and love today.

Now UA/CO on the other hand.. they took the worst aspects of each airline.

The reason I say that DL would be like US (or AA for that matter) without Song, is because they were exactly like US and AA in that time period.

Without Song, Delta would probably be similar to US Airways today.. Thankfully it isn’t.

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Most liveries look good from any angle.