Originally Posted by
Kacee
Um, HA has a strong presence at SFO. They have no fear of UA.
I wouldn't call 2 daily flights a strong presence, but okay. In reference to fortress hubs, I was referring to ATL, DFW, IAH, ORD, DEN and the like. The west coast market is the largest domestic draw for people to Hawaii. There's more than enough demand for HA to serve west coast hubs, like SEA, PDX, SFO and LAX.
The further one goes east, while visitors to Hawaii exist, in large numbers, there are a plethora of 1-stop options to Hawaii via the other airline fortress hubs, which make it a little more challenging for HA to serve those cities. JFK is a great example of the challenge. With so many options for one stop travel from the NYC area to Hawaii, HA has to price the nonstop flight just right, in order to fill the plane and fill it with fares that will make money. The population density of the NYC area helps make this flight successful as well as jetBlue's feed. HA has found the key to success in JFK and seems to be happy with the performance of this route. I would guess that JFK would need to be on firm footing before HA delves into other East Coast markets.