Am I past the point of no return?

[qwert5479]

I was just about to hit the "Declare Bankruptcy" button and I just couldn't do it....I know that it's probably a losing cause, but it seems like I still have a lot of time left to try and make a change....I just don't know if it would be worth messing with.

Could some of you more experienced guys look at my airline and tell me if I should pull the plug?

Here's some of the highlights-

Headquarters is at Tokyo Haneda, with a 2nd base at Sapporo.  Haneda business looks good on paper, but it's about 30% of what it once was.  I've seen a drastic reduction in ticket sales in the past 3-ish game months.  I believe this is due to several factors, I opened (and abandoned) a long-haul base at Narita, leased $28M/month in new planes (2-A380s, 2-777-200ERs, and 6 737-700ER) to fly from Narita, all on 5 year contracts that I can't terminate yet.  I have the 777s in storage but the others are now flying domestic routes.

Before the Narita expansion (8 weeks ago in game time), I was seeing $50M+ in sales every month, with about $20M in expenses.....Now I'm bringing in only $35M a week with $35M in expenses.  I do own 2 planes, a 737-900 that's worth around $64M and a 767-200 that's valued at $56M.  I've terminated the leases of every plane I could that's not turning a profit.....but those 10 new planes mentioned above that are on long-term leases are stuck in my hangar.  I currently have $203M in cash, and not a whole lot of credit....I could probably get a loan of $100M if I really needed to....if I used my planes as collateral. 

Is it possible to suffer such a decline and still turn it around and get back up to those $20M/week profit levels?  Would I be better off to just start over? 

[DanPavlovic]

In my humble opinion, the answer to your question is yes, you can still turn things around. The problem that you have/had is that you invested in some wrong birds for LH. Not that there is anything wrong with the planes as such but for the size airline that you are they are wrong. You needed to build up a solid base with SH before you went LH. The A380, 747D and 777 that you have are okeish, except for the 747D. If I was you I would get rid of them and get back to basics and invest in SH planes to build back. You have to many fleets at the moment. You should have 20+ of a model before investing in new fleets and even then b careful to keep it to as few fleets as possible due to the penalties you get when have you more then 3.

The 747D is a killer of airlines, great capacity, but any player with 3 x 737's or A318/19/20/21 etc. will take more of the market share then one mega plane. There are some airports that can support a plane like this but in this game I would never recommend it. 

If you go for LH you have to do it with a vengeance, 20 + planes and only pick one fleet to start with. The 777 in my opinion is great buy so is the 767 for routes that are under 5,000nm.

2nd base??? Way to early for that. You need a solid base before moving to other bases. And unless you decided to heavily invest in planes for the 2nd base then you need to close it down asap as its probably burning cash.

Anyway, I bought your 767 to help out so that you don't have to start from scratch.

Dan

[qwert5479]

I had a very solid short-haul business before I expanded.   I don't think that's where I went wrong....it was buying those 777 and A380s, and then giving up & closing the base too soon without giving it a chance.  The 747-400D were consistently profiting $3M per week, and I had 6 of them doing that.  I don't see how they are such a terrible choice.  When you're at a busy airport like Haneda where slots are $800k-$1M, I don't think a trio of 737s would be the better choice when you've got 95% LF on the 747.  I even had two of them that I configured with 200 Business class seats and even those stayed at 95%.  I was profiting $300k for a 1.5 hour flight.   I can see how they can be killers when you're not filling them, but they were the reason I was doing so well until I blew it all up. 

I know I have too many fleets but I'm not sure how to get out of that.....that's pretty much my main problem.  I'm locked into long leases on the 777s, A380s, 737-700ERs, and my entire CRJ fleet.  Even if I could terminate the leases and get rid of them, it would cost pretty much every bit of money I have. 

[qwert5479]

I'm starting over.