Newb Advice?

[an1m3n00b]

New AWS player here. airline: "Skyway Airlines in MT9"
Very soon I'll likely be bankrupt:
I currently have $-2m in the bank
and a value of $-10m.
I'm turning a weekly loss of about $1m and falling (in about 5 game-weeks i should be turning a profit).
I just started about 2 game months ago (yesterday irl).
I'm based in KRNO, and have 22 routes spread across 6a/c of 3 types:
2x B737-300 for city routes
1x DHC8-300 i'm trying to phase this out for 30pax & 100pax a/c.
3x Saab 340B for regional routes
All aircraft are configured to standard economy seats.
I'm running an average LF of 50%, (4 routes above 65%) and all but 2 routes are profitable.
All my a/c are leased.
the 737s and dash-8s are running 24/7 with fares 30-40% below default for redeyes.
both unprofitable routes are redeyes from rno-las, and both are running 737s (both low LF).
All other flights are set to 20% below default.
2 of my saab's currently run 0700-2400 (small airports aren't usually open at night, and larger ones run out of slots at night)
1 of my saab's is unscheduled, maybe i can ground the DH8 and swap in the saab for lower op costs?
I'm guessing it's better to terminate my unprofitable routes than it is to run a loss?
Should I raise my ticket prices?
Should I just let it BK and start over?

UPDATE: Just cancelled LAS route & raised tickets 5%.

[Sanabas]

What's your weekly revenue, and what's your weekly marketing expense?

[an1m3n00b]

weekly revenue is $1.17m
marketing is $341k.

[b757capt]

Your base is a big problem. The demand is too small to become a big airline.

However you should be able to survive with a small fleet there.

Fly be demand routes with 1 or 2 aircraft types, not more. The smaller you are the more you have to pay attention to costs.

Also watch your marketing, you shouldn't be spending more then you make!

[an1m3n00b]

 So is bigger better? Am i better off in a super airport like lax or atl?

[b757capt]

Well that's up to you.

If you want a 75 fleet airline RNO is a stretch.

[an1m3n00b]

At any large airport that i can see there's an oversupply on all the main routes, starting the game how can i possibly get a high enough LF to make a profit, should i start at a giant airport?

[dmoose42]

You can easily make money on a route that is oversupplied, just fly smaller planes, and you will make money.  If you try flying a 200 seat plane on a route that has 200 PAX demand, and two other airlines serve it, you will struggle to make any money, but if you fly that route with a 50 or 70 seat plane, you will do fine...

[brique]

You can easily make money on a route that is oversupplied, just fly smaller planes, and you will make money.  If you try flying a 200 seat plane on a route that has 200 PAX demand, and two other airlines serve it, you will struggle to make any money, but if you fly that route with a 50 or 70 seat plane, you will do fine...

You certainly can : rough rule of thumb I use is : divide demand by number of flights (not seats offered) : that figure is your potential share, all else being equal : after that, pricing, RI, CI, comfort, etc will decide the actual number that fly : so, if you can drop a flight, or two, in and keep your total seats offered inside that potential share, you can build a profitable route easily : further thing to keep in mind : if the competition is price-cutting to gain share, it will create additional demand above the stated figure drawn by the low prices : you can get a slice of that too so, once your RI has built, you may notice room for another flight, or may choose to raise your prices and increase revenue instead.

When looking at a route that is 'over-supplied' ; the question to ask is not how many seats are being offered above demand, but how many flights there are. If as described above by dmoose then look a bit closer and opportunities to compete successfully are there.

[an1m3n00b]

Do 1,2,3 flights/week count the as heavily as 7-days for supply purposes? Alot of airlines will have a different flight every day of the week instead of just 1.