Delta has a list of focus cities, and some are surprising
#32
Join Date: Jul 2012
Location: RDU
Programs: DL(PM), UA(Silver), AA(EXP) Marriott(Ti), HH(Gold), Hertz(PC)
Posts: 2,641
Yes, please. I fly between those two cities 8-12 times a year and would love a non-stop.
#33
Join Date: Dec 2010
Location: Washington, DC
Programs: Delta PM, Delta Reserve, Amex Plat, Bonvoy Gold, Hilton Diamond, Starbucks Gold ;)
Posts: 1,764
Focus City is marketing lingo for book with us, we love your city. It smart. Delta has some great marketing people.
Pat people on the back, tell them their airport is important and see if they can fill more planes. If it doesn’t work, they slowly decrease seats.
DL serves several airports that it doesn’t call focus cities with far more flights than SJC and BNA.
Pat people on the back, tell them their airport is important and see if they can fill more planes. If it doesn’t work, they slowly decrease seats.
DL serves several airports that it doesn’t call focus cities with far more flights than SJC and BNA.
#34
Join Date: Jul 2012
Location: RDU
Programs: DL(PM), UA(Silver), AA(EXP) Marriott(Ti), HH(Gold), Hertz(PC)
Posts: 2,641
In fact, I do that most of the time. Last year I flew RDU-Bay Area fourteen times, with two of them being non-stop to SFO on AS. The rest of the time, RDU-XXX-SJC.
#35
Join Date: Apr 2014
Posts: 1,635
It's good they're growing fast and hopefully it sticks, but the test will be in the next downturn. Maybe this time is different but you'd be a fool to bet on it.
#36
Join Date: Oct 2017
Location: BNA
Programs: DL GM, HH Diamond
Posts: 1,027
Focus City is marketing lingo for book with us, we love your city. It smart. Delta has some great marketing people.
Pat people on the back, tell them their airport is important and see if they can fill more planes. If it doesnt work, they slowly decrease seats.
DL serves several airports that it doesnt call focus cities with far more flights than SJC and BNA.
Pat people on the back, tell them their airport is important and see if they can fill more planes. If it doesnt work, they slowly decrease seats.
DL serves several airports that it doesnt call focus cities with far more flights than SJC and BNA.
Either way though glad BNA is one of Delta's focus cities. With the expansion Southwest is doing here, glad Delta isn't giving up.
#37
Join Date: Oct 2007
Programs: DL PM; Marriott Plat; Hilton Honors Gold
Posts: 257
Once the terminal B-C connection is finished at Boston Logan, WN will move out of terminal A and DL will have all of terminal A to themselves (save Westjet). It is hard to say that the 20 something gates in terminal A could be hub sized... If Boston is really going to be a transatlantic hub, DL better get some flights beyond the three Europe partner hubs and a handful of leisure destinations aimed at Boston’s ethnic demographic (looking at you DUB and LIS).
#38
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Mar 2013
Programs: DL PM, MR Titanium/LTP, Hilton Diamond
Posts: 10,130
It's the perfect type of route for the A220 if DL ever uses/is allowed to use the listed range of the A220 (especially with additional range coming from 2H 2020). Essentially a long, thin domestic route using the A220 the way UA has used the 787 for long, thin international routes.
In fact the A220 would be a perfect plane to try and make a go of SJC as a focus city -- it has the range to try and add some longer routes but still keeps capacity fairly low. As least as far as I can tell you could easily use the A220 (assuming you can use full range) on routes like SJC - BOS, SJC - JFK, SJC - ATL, SJC - AUS, etc and add the frequency benefits that SFO has without killing capacity
#39
Join Date: Feb 2012
Location: West LA
Programs: DL DM
Posts: 957
Go ahead and take a look. Btw, Orlando is landlocked. A better analogy would have been sinkhole.
#40
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Sep 2002
Location: IND
Programs: DL PM & 2MM™, Lifetime HHonors Diamond
Posts: 20,883
The days of sub-$200 airfares from my market to MCO are long over. And there are still some sub-$200 markets from my home area.
#42
Join Date: Oct 2017
Programs: DL Plat
Posts: 352
Their big shiny new lounges drew me in. I saw a review of the new (at the time) SEA club in 2016 and I thought to myself perhaps I should give delta a try as it looks far better than ua/aa. 3 years later and I am platinum for a third year in a row (SFO based).
#43
Join Date: May 2011
Location: AUS
Programs: DL GM, F9 50K, NK Gold...AS MVP 50K soon?
Posts: 213
Apparently Delta doesn't know where its own focus cities are. Sorry, "flies to hubs and actual focus cities plus Cancun/Orlando/Las Vegas" does not make a market a focus city. If it did, MCO and LAS would be focus cities.
Now, they may *want* to make BNA/SJC/AUS focus cities, and RDU absolutely already is one.
But for SJC, unless United spilling the beans about their contract with Apple costs them their contract with Apple, saying SJC will get Apple traffic on DL is a stretch. That said, if DL *can* run SJV-PVG with a 339, they'll have a superior product vs. the current 788 setup from UA. Add in a Nerd Bird a few times per day to AUS, starting on an E75 if they have to (then upgauging to a 221/223 later) and you have a base to build on.
From the noise they're making about AUS, I'd say that (my) city falls squarely in "not a focus cities but will be within a year". The aforementioned SJC flights, plus 1-2x daily to DEN and BNA would probably be where they'd start (despite DEN already being a very competitive route). Maybe IND. All current hubs and (real) focus cities are already covered (and hubs are rapidly swapping 717s or E75s for 319s or bigger) and E75/717/A220 should be about the right size to start the point to point traffic off at. My bet is DL could command a slight price premium on DEN is they ran it with A220s, which would probably make the route work well enough to compete with other airlines' mainline (and United's regionals...it says something that UA can't keep mainline to their hub there).
Yes, DL is 4th place at AUS right now, but they were only 18k passengers behind United in April. That's 300 per day per direction, so adding the aforementioned routes would likely put them over the edge into 3rd place (in part because some of that traffic would be pulled from UA). Throw in an international flight on Delta metal and you're comfortably in third place. Hitting second place (currently held by American) would be a good bit more difficult, but their operation at RDU would put them in a comfortable second place here, so maybe they'll go for that.
As for BNA, DL is already the largest legacy (though not by much). Southwest has much more of a lock on the market there than here, but that's probably more of an opportunity for Delta. Will be interesting to see what routes they decide to start there. Because, sorry, MCO and CUN seasonally does not a focus city make.
Now, they may *want* to make BNA/SJC/AUS focus cities, and RDU absolutely already is one.
But for SJC, unless United spilling the beans about their contract with Apple costs them their contract with Apple, saying SJC will get Apple traffic on DL is a stretch. That said, if DL *can* run SJV-PVG with a 339, they'll have a superior product vs. the current 788 setup from UA. Add in a Nerd Bird a few times per day to AUS, starting on an E75 if they have to (then upgauging to a 221/223 later) and you have a base to build on.
From the noise they're making about AUS, I'd say that (my) city falls squarely in "not a focus cities but will be within a year". The aforementioned SJC flights, plus 1-2x daily to DEN and BNA would probably be where they'd start (despite DEN already being a very competitive route). Maybe IND. All current hubs and (real) focus cities are already covered (and hubs are rapidly swapping 717s or E75s for 319s or bigger) and E75/717/A220 should be about the right size to start the point to point traffic off at. My bet is DL could command a slight price premium on DEN is they ran it with A220s, which would probably make the route work well enough to compete with other airlines' mainline (and United's regionals...it says something that UA can't keep mainline to their hub there).
Yes, DL is 4th place at AUS right now, but they were only 18k passengers behind United in April. That's 300 per day per direction, so adding the aforementioned routes would likely put them over the edge into 3rd place (in part because some of that traffic would be pulled from UA). Throw in an international flight on Delta metal and you're comfortably in third place. Hitting second place (currently held by American) would be a good bit more difficult, but their operation at RDU would put them in a comfortable second place here, so maybe they'll go for that.
As for BNA, DL is already the largest legacy (though not by much). Southwest has much more of a lock on the market there than here, but that's probably more of an opportunity for Delta. Will be interesting to see what routes they decide to start there. Because, sorry, MCO and CUN seasonally does not a focus city make.
#44
Join Date: Jan 2008
Location: SJC/YUL
Programs: DL PM, Marriott Gold
Posts: 3,869
But for SJC, unless United spilling the beans about their contract with Apple costs them their contract with Apple, saying SJC will get Apple traffic on DL is a stretch. That said, if DL *can* run SJV-PVG with a 339, they'll have a superior product vs. the current 788 setup from UA. Add in a Nerd Bird a few times per day to AUS, starting on an E75 if they have to (then upgauging to a 221/223 later) and you have a base to build on.
ICN is the only Asian city I can see DL trying.
#45
Join Date: Jan 2018
Location: SJC/SFO. EWR/JFK
Programs: AS MVP 100K, DL PL
Posts: 534
Though not related, UA tried SJC-EWR, then discontinued in a year. Both DL and AS add SJC-JFK.