I wish them success and hope this leads to a future where they are a bigger competitor and have new domestic growth prospects.Īlaska does not have a coherent growth strategy because they are trying to replicate the growth of 2010-2015 using largely the same tactics from that era. I predict Jetblue will add more seats to planes, but may also copy Spirit’s “Big Front Seat” concept domestically for a mint lite product. LAS is a perfect example - it is a market where Spirit fills planes opportunistically with impulse buying low fares, JetBlue can’t make money doing that with existing seat counts and cost structure. Jetblue isn’t really acquiring NK customers since they are often infrequent price conscious fliers, they are just eliminating one lower fare competitor and hope customers chose them now that they have one less option. If it wasn’t compelling enough to organically grow, not sure what makes them think things will be different. Jetblue acquiring Spirit gives them scale and presence in some key markets, but it is unclear if JetBlue can be successful with their existing product model. Delta may have lost with Song, but their domestic product has been great with wifi and TVs to compete in NY. Budget fliers complain about Spirit, but ultimately book that $59 fare. Frequent flier elites want first class, need a big route network. Their strategy to be in the middle – reasonable fares and reasonable product may fit what customers say they want, but not what they actually choose. Many people like JetBlue, but don’t necessarily “love” JetBlue. Maybe they were too early as AUS boomed after B6 pulled down the experiment with the withdrawal of the e190 from the west coast, but it was right idea that didn’t work. Unfortunately, JetBlue couldn’t capitalize. They signed a UT sponsorship and tried to market heavily. AUS was ideal with a young urban culture and many ties to NY and California. When B6 entered AUS years ago, the idea was to turn it into a mid-continent connection hub to send the e190s east and west. If JetBlue changes post-merger despite what it says today, that could change the calculus in a more favorable way. The big caveat here is that we don’t really know what the JetBlue product and positioning will be. I’m just not sure where this one will fall.Īll of these markets have similar traits, but the real question is… where does the new JetBlue fit? In a place like Detroit, there may be actual opportunity, albeit likely not an enormous one. JetBlue will already have a mega focus city up the road in Fort Lauderdale, so that reduces the impact from a Miami focus as well. That could be an airport constraint, in which case I’m sure it would love some divestment, or it could just be a commercial decision. We’ve seen Frontier pull down some of its Miami flying and focus elsewhere in recent months. But Spirit went into the market in a big way. JetBlue is in there with Boston and JFK but also Newark and Los Angeles. Miami is a market that changed dramatically during the pandemic with many airlines starting and growing service, including JetBlue and Spirit. JetBlue saved the biggest question mark for last.
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