Megabus may end bargain bus service from Los Angeles
Talk about a cheap fling that didn't last: Apparently even $1 fares to San Francisco and Las Vegas aren't enough to lure Angelenos out of their cars.
Megabus.com, a subsidiary of Coach USA that began bargain bus service in August from Los Angeles, has stopped taking bookings on several routes for trips after June 8. Megabus stopped serving San Diego and Phoenix from L.A. earlier this year and may end all service from the city.
Dale Moser, president of Megabus.com, said today that the Paramus, N.J., company, which operates a thriving network in the Midwest and elsewhere, expects to decide by Friday whether to pull out of Los Angeles.
"Quite frankly, the ridership hasn't been as robust as we'd like," Moser said. "We might just have to discontinue" the service.
Although the company's 56-seat buses sometimes pull out of Los Angeles 75% or 80% full, they sometimes carry as few as 12 riders, he said. "We're not seeing increasing trends. The graph has leveled off."
That's in sharp contrast to the Midwest, where Megabus.com serves 17 cities and has seen its business increase 137% during the last year, Moser said. The company, which began service in April 2006, recently expanded to eight East Coast cities.
Moser said he didn't know why more Californians haven't warmed up to Megabus.
Given high gasoline prices, congested roads, growing environmental consciousness and marquee destinations such as Los Angeles and Las Vegas, "we all truly believed that this would be an outstanding market," he said.
"Maybe, truth be told, we were unable to get them out of their cars," he said.
As of today, Megabus.com had stopped taking bookings from Los Angeles to Las Vegas, San Jose and Millbrae for trips after June 8, and from Los Angeles to San Francisco and Oakland after June 22, Moser said.
He said those actions were precautions, pending a final decision.
"We will honor the tickets that have been sold," he said. "We're not going to leave passengers stranded."
travel.latimes.com
Comments
I have been in the travel business in LA County since 1987 and pride myself of knowing all there is to know about travel, especially out of L.A. BUT! the first time I ever hear of the "Megabus may end bargain bus service from Los Angeles" was when it was announced they were pulling out of L.A. due to lack of ridership!!!! DUH!!!! It is no wonder they are pulling out, they forgot to tell the travel industry they were "in" the market. The backbone of the travel industry is the retail travel agent. It is NOT the online megasites [i.e. Travelocity, Orbits, et al] There is nothing to replace the 'local travel agent'. If the Megabus folks would have marketed to the local travel agency community in the cities they served, past tense! then they would have been successful. Anyone with half a brain could have done better at marketing their product! Obviously they did not have anyone in charge of marketing that knew the travel business! From what I have read about the cancelled service it was a great idea, with pitiful marketing! Tons of people go to San Francisco, Palm Springs, Las Vegas, Santa Barbara, and San Diego for quick getaways, and with the cost of gasoline, the Megabus idea would have been great! had it been marketed to people who sell travel! There are thousands upon thousands of travel agents in the markets the Megabus was trying to serve, all ready willing and waiting to sell their product! AMTRAK does a "fair" job marketing to travel agents, but they too could do a better job!
I also agree with the other two posts. I only learned about it from someone who heard about it from someone else. I've taken it may times and LOVE IT!!! I've also told may other people about it and they were excited to learn about it. It's such a great service and if they would have taken the investement into even 1 park bench ad, they would get soooo much more business. I blame the marketing guy from the Megabus, not the disinterest of the Los
Angeles people. Hire me on, I could make the service successful.
I agree with the commenter before me. This service is great but I wouldn't have heard except by luck. I think a few TV spots would go a long way especially now that it is getting more expensive to travel LA to SF by car.
I think the main reason more people aren't taking Megabus from LA is because they don't know about it. I just recently learned that they existed because of a travel email I received.
The location of the bus is also not an easy find. Most people who work inside of Union Station couldn't even tell me where to go and find the bus.
How is Megabus even marketed in the Los Angeles area? Had it not been for a fluke, I'd still be clueless. Once I did find out about it, I used it to San Fransisco and it was a great trip. I have recommended it to others.
Again, had I not recieved a travel related email, I would have no idea that they were stopping so many of their services. Even low cost outlets need to advertise.
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