Southwest Airlines

Southwest Airlines is an American low-cost airline headquartered in Dallas, Texas, founded in 1967 by Herb Kelleher and Rollin King and beginning service in 1971 with flights among Dallas, Houston and San Antonio. It pioneered the point-to-point, single-aircraft-type low-cost carrier model in the United States, operating an all-Boeing 737 fleet, and its approach later became a template widely studied and copied by budget airlines worldwide, including Ryanair and easyJet in Europe. Southwest is the largest low-cost carrier in the United States by passengers carried and, for most of its history, distinguished itself from network carriers by not assigning seats and by not charging for a first and second checked bag.