Recently, there has been a major shift on how Southwest Airlines display their fares. This news also showed that the fares of Southwest are now on travel search site Kayak so customers can compare fares and schedule with other airlines. This is a dramatic change from the previously followed strategy by Southwest of not permitting third-party companies display their schedule and fare information.
A report noted that the integration has been incremental, with Southwest fares popping up in Google Flights back in May, per TPG. On Monday, Kayak was added to that very small list of companies approved to show Southwest’s data.
The change was corroborated in a sample flight search conducted by the article from Raleigh-Durham International Airport to Baltimore/Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport in October. Now, the search results include Southwest options with both their Wanna Get Away and Wanna Get Away Plus fares.
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However, it was interesting that Southwest fares could be compared by users but they couldn’t directly book on this site. It leads the users to the website of Southwest for booking—a sort of trial partnership, one of which was termed by Southwest as a pilot.
Steve Hafner, Chief Executive Officer of Kayak said that the company was thrilled about this because it grows out of an already established relationship with Southwest which started in 2022 when Kayak for Business’ customers began seeing rates from Southwest.
The story cast this modification against a backdrop of several recent changes at Southwest Airlines coinciding with reports that its financial performance was lagging behind. In a July 25 earnings call, Andrew Watterson, who is the chief commercial officer at Southwest described their entry onto Google Flights as a key strategy to increase passengers.
Southwest’s other mentioned changes also included casting off its old open-seating policy and introducing extra legroom options while upping utilization by flying more red-eyes.
Kayak’s increased presence according to Southwest will enable customers to have “enhanced visibility” into available fares and flight options with regard to this airliner. The much warmer reception has been due to exposing more consumers to its special blend of value, policies and flight service.
Southwest did not mention plans to allow more third-party sites to show its flight information shortly.
The report said that, in a broader industry perspective, other budget airlines like Frontier and Spirit have been making similar announcements to change their fare display methods to a four-tiered setup similar to those of larger network airlines. Changes at the industry level would present travelers with a better view of their options when making travel decisions.