Assess the consequences to a business, such as spirit airlines of selling tickets online

A positive consequence is that the cost of distribution is zero as Spirit airlines is not required to give commission to travel agents. This means that Spirit Airlines can reduce the prices of their fares which would mean that Spirit airlines can reach a wider customer base over a wider geographic area in the US. This means they are likely to have higher sales volume, allowing for them to gain higher operating profits. This would mean they could reinvest into enlarging their product portfolio by creating flights routes across different states allowing them to remain competitive in the monopolistic market of low cost airlines.A negative consequence is that they may isolate a certain demographic such as older people through online distribution. This is because of them being less familiar with the internet. This means that they would have a lower sales volume during off peak seasons such as term time as students are less likely to travel. This means that their flights would have less passengers, meaning that the fixed costs are spread over less people. This under capacity utilisation would make them less efficient, making their costs rise and making them uncompetitiveOverall, distributing online has more positive consequences as they can reach more people across the US, with their customer service reputation not being affected. This is because they have branded themselves to be a low cost airline therefore, a high level of customer service is not expected of them. However, they may isolate older people as they may not understand the buying process of adding on costs and more. overall, they are an airline for a younger target customer which means old people are less likely to travel as they are likely to choose more luxury flights due to the higher savings they are expected to have.