Spirit Airlines 2015 Annual Report Download - page 4

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PART I
ITEM 1. BUSINESS
Overview
Spirit Airlines is an ultra low-cost, low-fare airline that offers affordable travel to price-conscious customers. Our all-
Airbus Fit FleetTM, the youngest fleet of any major U.S. airline, currently operates more than 385 daily flights to 56 destinations
in the United States, Caribbean and Latin America. Our stock trades on the NASDAQ Global Select Stock Market under the
symbol "SAVE."
Our ultra low-cost carrier, or ULCC, business model allows us to compete principally by offering customers our Bare
Fares TM, which are unbundled base fares that remove components traditionally included in the price of an airline ticket. We
then give customers Frill Control TM, which provides customers the freedom to save by paying only for the options they choose
such as bags, advance seat assignments and refreshments. We record revenue related to these options in our financial statements
as non-ticket revenue.
Our History and Corporate Information
We were founded in 1964 as Clippert Trucking Company, a Michigan corporation. We began air charter operations in
1990 and renamed ourselves Spirit Airlines, Inc. in 1992. In 1994, we reincorporated in Delaware, and in 1999 we relocated our
headquarters to Miramar, Florida.
Our mailing address and executive offices are located at 2800 Executive Way, Miramar, Florida 33025, and our telephone
number at that address is [phone]. We are subject to the information and periodic reporting requirements of the
Securities Exchange Act of 1934, or Exchange Act, and, in accordance therewith, file periodic reports, proxy statements and
other information with the Securities and Exchange Commission or SEC. Such periodic reports, proxy statements and other
information are available for inspection and copying at the SEC's Public Reference Room at 100 F Street, NE., Washington,
DC 20549 or may be obtained by calling the SEC at 1-800-SEC-0330. In addition, the SEC maintains a website at http://
www.sec.gov that contains reports, proxy statements and other information regarding issuers that file electronically with the
SEC. We also post on the Investor Relations page of our website, www.spirit.com, a link to our filings with the SEC, our
Corporate Governance Guidelines and Code of Business Conduct and Ethics, which applies to all directors and all our
employees, and the charters of our Audit, Compensation, Finance, Safety, Security and Operations and Nominating and
Corporate Governance committees. Our filings with the SEC are posted as soon as reasonably practical after they are filed
electronically with the SEC. Please note that information contained on our website is not incorporated by reference in, or
considered to be a part of, this report. You can also obtain copies of these documents free of charge by writing to us at:
Corporate Secretary, Spirit Airlines, Inc., 2800 Executive Way, Miramar, Florida 33025.
Our Business Model
Our ULCC business model provides customers low, unbundled base fares with a range of optional services, allowing
customers the freedom to choose only the options they value. The success of our model is driven by our low cost structure,
which permits us to offer low base fares while maintaining high profit margins.
We are focused on price-sensitive travelers who pay for their own travel, and our business model is designed to deliver
what we believe our customers want: low fares. We aggressively use low fares to address an underserved market, which helps
us to increase passenger volume, load factors and non-ticket revenue on the flights we operate. We also have high-density
seating configurations on our aircraft and a simplified onboard product designed to lower costs, which is part of our Plane
SimpleTM strategy. High passenger volumes and load factors help us sell more ancillary products and services, which in turn
allows us to reduce the base fare we offer even further. We strive to be recognized by our customers and potential customers as
the low-fare leader in the markets we serve.
We compete based on total price. We believe other airlines have used an all-inclusive price concept to effectively maintain
higher total prices to consumers, rather than lowering fares by unbundling each product or service. For example, carriers that
tout “free bags” have included the cost of checking bags in the total ticket price, which does not allow passengers to see how
much they would save if they did not check luggage. We believe that we and our customers benefit when we allow our
customers to know the total price of their travel by breaking out the cost of optional products or services.
We allow our customers to see all available options and their respective prices prior to purchasing a ticket, and this full
transparency illustrates that our total price, including options selected, is lower than other airlines on average. In 2014, we