Business Case Study Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words

Business Case Study - Essay Example The paper discusses the history of the Airline, strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats (SWOT), discusses an appropriate strategy that can be adopted by the airline to achieve growth. Southwest (2009) Southwest airline was formed in 1971 by Herb Kelleher and Rollin King, their main aim was to offer freights to customers at the lowest price possible and also make sure consumers arrived at their destinations on time. The company has expanded over the years and today the airline offers services to over seventy million consumers in a year. (Southwest (2009)) In 1979 the company introduced a self service ticket booking machine, this increased convenience to consumers. However in this year the airline could only offer services to 3 states, in 1983 the airline expanded and increased its destinations to over 34 cities. After the September 11 attack the airline still recorded a profit but its revenue declined by60%, in the following year the number of destinations increased to 58 cities. In 2004 the company was ranked as the fourth largest carrier given that the number of consumers per years had increased and the company had made profits for over 30 year in a row. (Southwest (2009)) Today the airline is still one of the best performing countries and its strategy has helped the company to achieve high growth and make profits over the years, the number of destinations have increased and due ... However a major problem is that other airlines have adopted the company's strategies and this has reduced its competitive position in the airline industry. (Southwest (2009)) B. SWOT analysis: This section discusses the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats of Southwest airlines: Strengths: There are a number of internal strengths of the company, these strengths include: 1. Low fare prices: The company offers low fare prices, the low fare prices results into increased ticket demand; increased usage helps the company to realize economies of scale and therefore achieves high profits. 2. Online booking: The company has an advantage in that over 50% of booking are made online, it online booking services helps promote convenience to the customers. 3. unionized workers and flexible working hours: One in four employees of the company is a union member. However the company is still able to negotiate flexible working hours despite many employees being members of a union. (Robinson (2002)) Weaknesses: The company has a number of weaknesses and they include: 1. International freights: The company only offers services to a limited number of destinations, the company offers services to58 destinations only, it offers short distance freights and does not offer international freights that would help the company increase number of freights and revenue. (Robinson (2002)) 2. Boeing 737: The company only uses one product which is Boeing 7373 and this may be considered a major drawback to the company given that its reputation could be highly affected if the safety of such aircrafts is compromised. 3. Unionized workers: A large number of the company's employees are unionized, this affects the company given that negotiation regarding wages and working hours are done by a