Unsold sleepers

[flitcraft]

Here's a parallel situation. I walk into a restaurant half an hour before closing on a Sunday night. When the waiter comes to take my order, I say, "I would like the halibut. How about five bucks?" "What, are you crazy? It says right on the menu, 25 dollars." "Well, sure," I reply, "But you are just about to shut for the night, and tomorrow you're closed. You know the Board of Health won't let you sell it by Tuesday, so if you don't sell it to me, it goes to waste. Five bucks beats getting nothing for it. That's my final offer."  Think I'd get the halibut for a five spot? Me neither.

 

[Thirdrail7]

There was a time when Amtrak would call people with coach reservations, days or weeks in advance of their trip, and offer discount upgrades to sleeper. (I was the recipient of one of these calls in 2002, when a friend and I were booked L.A.-to-Oakland on the Coast Starlight. If I recall correctly, the offer was $75 for the both of us, which I accepted immediately.)

I got a similar call to my home phone in Calif many yearsr ago when I was on a business trip in Colorado, offering to upgrade my coach reservation for the next day to a roomette from Denver to Emeryville for $100. My wife took the call and informed me of the offer. I asked her to “book ‘em, Danno!” and enjoyed that upgrade.

When I rode Coach most of the time I would get a call from Amtrak to upgrade to a roomette for a very attractive price and I always accepted. I take it they dont do that anymore.

 

They used to have a desk that supported this operation.  It was called the stand by desk. You could even put your name on it and you received first call if something opened up. That usually worked, but if it didn't, they'd work to sell the space on their own.

I'm sure you can imagine what happened to it. <_<

 

[Thirdrail7]

Here's a parallel situation. I walk into a restaurant half an hour before closing on a Sunday night. When the waiter comes to take my order, I say, "I would like the halibut. How about five bucks?" "What, are you crazy? It says right on the menu, 25 dollars." "Well, sure," I reply, "But you are just about to shut for the night, and tomorrow you're closed. You know the Board of Health won't let you sell it by Tuesday, so if you don't sell it to me, it goes to waste. Five bucks beats getting nothing for it. That's my final offer."  Think I'd get the halibut for a five spot? Me neither.

A similar operation did work in getting me a great deal on a vehicle. I told them this is what I'd pay for it. They quoted the sticker price which was already deeply discounted.  I told them this was my final offer and the fact the car has been sitting for 5 months and it now into the next fiscal year shows the car isn't moving and won't move in the winter months.   You can rid yourself of the vehicle now or take your chances. They balked, I left and received a call.

They saw things my way.

On a smaller scale, I got a dozen donuts for the price of three since they were just going  to throw them out.

Hmmm. Maybe we should all try this. Stop booking sleepers and just show up to the trains and say "take it or leave it!!!!!"

 

[Cho Cho Charlie]

 On a smaller scale, I got a dozen donuts for the price of three since they were just going  to throw them out.

My local supermarket kind of does something like that.     On a rack located on the completely opposite side of the store, from the bakery dept, they offer baked goods that will expire the next day.  So, you can buy a dozen donuts for half-price.   Perfectly OK, if you are planning to eat them soon.    Being on the opposite side, the rack really doesn't interfere with them selling full price baked goods.

 

[gswager]

Out of curiosity, which one if the car is full, has the most profit- sleeper (after paying for meals) or coach?

 

[neroden]

Out of curiosity, which one if the car is full, has the most profit- sleeper (after paying for meals) or coach?

A couple of us analyzed this carefully a while back using the best available data.  It turns out it depends on which train you're looking at!

The coaches are more profitable on the Western and Southern trains.  The sleepers are far more profitable on the Lake Shore Limited, and probably the Cardinal and Capitol Limited as well.  Interesting, eh?  It's hard to tell but it looks like the sleeper from Boston to Newport News was more profitable than coach on the "Night Owl"/"Twilight Shoreliner" back before it was removed, too.

This says to me that the most important sleeper market is East Coast - Chicago, and yes, cancelling the Broadway Limited was a huge mistake and NY-Philadelphia-Chicago direct service should come back.  Also, Viewliner sleepers should be assigned first to the LSL and Cardinal.