Southwest Weighs Future of the ‘Cattle Call’

It was 40 minutes before Southwest Airlines Flight 300 to Oakland was scheduled to depart from Burbank’s Bob Hope Airport. Already the barbarians were at the gates.

Passengers stood or sat on the floor or in nearby chairs, anxiously holding their spot in line in anticipation of the everyone-for-themselves crush that is boarding a Southwest Airlines flight.

Sitting on the floor at the gate entrance marked with the letter B was Beth Thomas-Kim of Pacific Palisades. She had secured her place at the front of the line for boarding group B. As anyone who has flown Southwest knows, passengers are assigned to group A, B or C based on when they check in for their flights, which can be as many as 24 hours in advance online.

“I learned from last time,” she said. “I knew I had to plop down and stake my claim.”

Nearly a dozen others ended up seated on the floor near her. Before the flight began to board, lines snaked from the boarding area into the hallway.

But long lines and plopping down at the gate may become a thing of the past. Southwest announced recently that it was studying the idea of assigned seating.

“It would be a couple of years before it could become a reality,” Southwest spokesman Ed Stewart said. “People seem to think it’s imminent, and nothing could be further from the truth.”

Before Southwest makes any decisions, it needs to “study, study, study” assigned seating, he said. And talking to customers will no doubt be a part of those studies.

Despite sitting on the hard floor for more than an hour (the flight was delayed), Thomas-Kim had mixed feelings about the idea of assigned seating on Southwest.

She flies almost exclusively on United Airlines when she travels on business, where she enjoys premier perks of pre-boarding, assigned seats and expedited check-in.

“All those things matter when you’re schlepping,” she said.

But for a one-hour flight to Oakland on her own dime to visit family in Santa Rosa, she’s willing to make the extra effort to get a good seat. Still, she’d welcome assigned seating on Southwest “if it doesn’t impact their current great service.”

Southwest is consistently one of the top-rated U.S. airlines. For March, the latest period for which data are available, it had the fewest complaints of any major airline: 0.14 complaint per 100,000 enplanements (a measure of the number of passengers), according to Transportation Department statistics. Last-place U.S. Airways (which now includes America West) had 1.41. According to the University of Michigan’s annual American customer satisfaction index released this month, Southwest was rated the No. 1 airline for 10 years running.

And not all passengers mind the seating free-for-all. Neil Moss, who was on a recent Southwest flight from Burbank to Salt Lake City, likes the A-B-C method: “Assigned seating is inconvenient.”

The Southwest method, he said, means “you can just get on the plane and sit where you want to sit.”

So why change?

Perhaps the answer can be found by talking to people who avoid flying Southwest. I walked though the Bob Hope terminal over to America West, which has assigned seating. Passengers were comfortably waiting to board a flight to Phoenix. There were no crowds of people standing or sitting on the floor at the gate. And, tellingly, there were significantly more laptops and suits -- read business travelers -- at America West.

Electrical engineer Tom Wieczkowski was heading home to Phoenix after three days of work in Burbank. He travels frequently on business on a number of airlines, including, on occasion, Southwest. All things being equal, he’d rather have an assigned seat.

“I hate being treated like cattle,” he said. If Southwest were to adopt assigned seats, it would influence his decision to fly the airline.

The “cattle call” is a complaint well known to the folks at Southwest. There are passengers who wouldn’t fly without an assigned seat even if you were offering $10 flights, Stewart said.

Industry analysts believe that is something the airline needs to pay attention to.

“The surge to the seat turns off many passengers,” said John D. Kasarda, a professor of management at University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and an expert on aviation infrastructure and logistics. “In the past, Southwest was willing to default such passengers to other airlines. Today’s market conditions do not allow this.

“Assigned seating may be necessary to keep Southwest competitive,” he said.

For now, Southwest passengers must still fight the good fight for a good seat.

“You won’t see it in ’06 and you won’t see it in ‘07,” Stewart said.

And after that?

“You do your due diligence, and if it works for you, you do it.”

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Times staff writer Catharine Hamm contributed to this report. James Gilden can be reached at james.gilden@ latimes.com.