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seat sale
DCHP-2 (Jul 2016)
n. — Transportation
a sale of discounted airline tickets.
Type: 3. Semantic Change — Seat sale in the US is usually employed to refer to ticket sales at large-scale sporting events. In the context of airline ticket sales, the term is currently more prevalent in Canada. Chart 1, despite some noise, is able to mirror that numerical difference somewhat.
See also COD-2, s.v. "seat sale", which is marked "Cdn & Brit".
See also COD-2, s.v. "seat sale", which is marked "Cdn & Brit".
The term seat sale was in widespread use from the late 1970s to 2011. Since that point, Canadian print media at least have moved away from the term.
Quotations
1978
Laker expects to conduct seat sales for about 10 days preceding the cutoff date for unfilled flights, which would be 21 days before departure.
1985
Saskatchewan won a round with Air Canada yesterday when the airline said it will include the province in its latest seat sale.
1990
The Lufthansa seat sale runs from Oct. 14 to March 20. Fares must be booked 21 days in advance. Minimum stay is seven days and the maximum is one month.
1998
On top of the lost sales, the airline has been forced to offer bigger-than-usual discount fares in a seat sale held to win back customers - many of whom were angry about the strike after being left stranded.
2008
Erickson said he expects there to be a lot more seat sales, in which airlines offer aggressively discounted fares for two or three days at a time.
2012
When a seat sale from Vancouver to Halifax costs $300 (about half of what it was 10 years ago), yet costs the airline double what it was 10 years ago, something has to suffer. Did you really think everybody wins in a seat sale?
References
- COD-2
Images
