Originally Posted by
iahphx
I just looked at the October fares between PHL and MIA: a route I just flew on Frontier for $15, and which AA/US is clearly unhappy to have the competition.
But other than the weird (and unsustainable) $15 fares, it generally costs $30 more each way to fly AA/US instead of Frontier. That's pretty much Frontier's bag fee. So unless you're the unusual person who can travel with just a backback or insist on checking a bag instead of carrying it aboard, it's hard to understand why you'd fly Frontier unless you were unfamiliar with their additional fees.
Peak flying to So. Florida might be between January-May. So, maybe fares will be higher and more varying between AA and F9, where F9 will be still a better value for those looking to save money. I did see some dates in October where F9's base fare is $59 on that route and $29 for DenDeal customers, while AA's fares on nonstops are north of $120 or more.
JetBlue will be starting PHL-FLL next year and adding more seats/competition into the market, so it will be different next year for Frontier than it was this year.
Whatever the case if Frontier can't make money any longer on the route, it's route planners just move the flight elsewhere. Not so fun esp. if PHL loses a route, but F9 is a private company and as consumer there isn't much relationship between us and them, other than them providing transit for a given ticket.
On another note, I still find it odd there is no flight service between Lehigh Valley (ABE) and South Florida.
Looking at population numbers, if Philadelphia's metropolitan area - Berks County is 7 million, and Lehigh Valley + Berks Co. = 1.2 million (as Berks Co is closer to ABE), that is a 85% to 15% ratio between the two neighboring regions. Yet PHL+ACY have a high number of South Florida flights, but ABE has none? Seems like F9 or G4 could offer one nonstop and it'd be popular. ABE is also closer to the Poconos which could be a nice escape for So. Floridians to visit in the summer. But, ABE doesn't fit in the profile of the airport that F9 is seeking anymore.
F9 wants to be in primary major market airports much like it's successful peer Spirit. Spirit has shown success on several of it's PHL routes even before F9 came into PHL.
Back when US and WN were fare matching NK on PHL-Dallas with WN matching on 1-stops, I used to wonder why people would choose Spirit when US was fare matching comparable nonstops. I looked at load factors on NK's PHL-DFW, and indeed NK LF's were still high. It could be also there were a lot of late bookings that help filled NK's flight, when US was likely charging more.
However, I did notice (more recently) that routes like PHL-DFW/LAS on Spirit do offer connections westbound, so Spirit isn't likely entirely depending on O&D. At times, Spirit fares will show up between PHL and Bay Area on kayak as the lowest, with a PHL-DFW/LAS-OAK type itinery.