sbm12

Who, me??
I could only type so fast and was working on a lot of things during that part of the presentation. Overall I think it will be a positive outcome as JetBlue starts to add more value and another tier to the Mosaic program. They really do understand the yield premium that Mosaics pay (and it must be other Mosaics because I'm still cheap). Also, there were already some challenges with the qualification level set at $5k spend with the domestic Mint product. If one r/t biz fare to London gets you status then the system is skewed the wrong way.

I could see the qualifying spend tick up to $6k and a second tier at 12k or 18k or something like that. Though I also don't know what they'd give away at the higher tier.

I also generally agree that it was a bit anticlimactic since we all knew London would be announced. Still, the number of planes involved means it'll be more than just London. And confirmation that it is a new product is nice, even if we didn't get confirmation on the Vantage Solo seat yet. JetBlue is milking this for all the media coverage it can score. The company hasn't paid for a single ad yet on the London service and people have been talking about it for years, specifically parroting the company line about slashing fares. Genius from the marketing side, even as I find it mildly annoying.

HepperSchepp

Back in the day we used to do AA Gold/Plat challenges on the first Biz flight a staff member took to Asia. So it's not unheard of. I <3 mosiac. I cancel and rebook so often to save money on flights.

bennos

From the PR release...

1. Is it weird that they'd announce service to London without announcing the airports? Presumably this means they haven't concluded any slot procurement transactions. Given that all LON airports (LHR, LGW, LCY, LTN, STN) are Level 3 coordinated does that make this announcement premature?
2. Airports is plural. If B6 ends up with split operations on the LON side that could reduce desirability for the business segment (but perhaps less so for leisure).

dtremit

Don't get me wrong, I didn't think you were being vague -- I thought JetBlue was!

The tightrope they have to walk is that a huge number of the Mosaics paying that 1.6x fare aren't flying to LHR, or even on a ton of Mint-equipped flights. And given DL's competition in BOS, even business fares sometimes aren't high; I paid less than $600 for a 48-hour advance booking BOS-ATL recently, and an upcoming RIC roundtrip is currently hovering at $210.

They do already have two paths to Mosaic -- $5k base, or 30 segments + $4k base. (Given the numbers they released today, it sounds like 30 segments is above average, which sort of surprised me.) Increasing the revenue-only qualifying rules while leaving the segments+revenue number alone might thread the needle.

I also think it's interesting that they (separately) mentioned leaving money on the table with Blue Flex and other upfare options. I'm sure it's unintentional, but nearly all their auxiliary sources of revenue -- Blue Plus and Flex fares, the JetBlue card benefits, JetBlue Vacations -- are pointless for business travelers who actually earn Mosaic by flying.

usbusinesstraveller

dtremit

It's clear (from regulatory filings, among other evidence) that B6 is fighting hard for LHR slots. But they don't have them yet -- and I suspect that getting some, but not enough for all flights, is possible if not likely.

LGW / STN / LTN slots aren't that hard (read:expensive) to obtain, and I suspect B6 has a contingency plan in place for acquiring them if LHR falls through. But buying them now could undermine their LHR lobbying effort.

As for split ops -- it depends on how they split them, I'd think. If they send all BOS flights to one airport, and all JFK flights to the other, most passengers probably wouldn't even notice the split ops.

(LCY is off the table for the 321neo, of course -- and my understanding is that the A220-300 is kind of marginal as well.)

caburrito

737's to Hawaii is more exciting than lie flat direct isle access business class to London? Huh.

hi55us

It looks like Jet Blue is wading into this market with a cautious approach. Rather then a rollout in the summer of 2020, they went with the slow and cautious rollout schedule in 2021.

A lot can change in the market the next 2 years. We've already seen Wow air fold up operations, who knows if Norwegian will still be around then, so I think there's a chance B6 succeeds.

I think the cautious rollout this is the best approach for Jet Blue, but they need to be able to differentiate their product, because the competition has a 2 year head start.

Some things I think Jet Blue needs to do to differentiate is making connections easier at Boston and JFK. They shouldn't be focusing on these flights as BOS/JFK-LGW flights, which are super competitive. They should be focusing on the business traveler flying JAX-JFK-LGW.

Make the outbound flight require no change of aircraft, so I can seamlessly fly SMF-JFK-LGW. Make it easy to book a ticket in Main Cabin and then Mint. But most importantly, improve your customer service. I can't count how many times I've seen the help desk in Boston backed up with 50+ passengers. With all this extra connecting traffic, you're going to have more irrops and more demand for agents at Boston and New York. You're going to have to setup additional help desks, perhaps with dedicated agents for TATL flights. You're also, in my opinion, going to have to improve the lounge product. Having a dedicated Jet Blue lounge, with Jet Blue agents to handle IRROPS, will help lure away some business travelers from the European carriers and domestic carriers who are competing heavily in the London market. Keep in mind that the initial Mint routes only had competition from the US3 and Alaska/VA. NYC-LHR/LGW is going to have competition from the US3 + european competitors like BA and VS.

lowfareair

How do they make connections easier besides having the outbound flight require no change of aircraft? As of now, they are only in one terminal at each airport so walking time is minimal. Having no change of aircraft sounds great, but likely won't happen as 1) These sound like Mint-heavy aircraft and will only fit certain routes (i.e. not SMF) and 2) it only benefits one city per flight and 3) will eventually require more LR aircraft beyond the 13 they are ordering as flying West Coast - BOS/JFK - Europe and back will require 2 aircraft to do it daily.

MSYtoJFKagain

That simply won't happen. They are never going to waste Mint-equipped planes on non-premium route (like SMF).

Having smart connection times from SFO/LAX->BOS/JFK->LON will likely be a priority over anything else.

RWPrincess

Re: the Mosaic updates. I know they've been researching this for a while now with existing Mosaics. So I'm wondering if it may be more program changes rather than monetary changes. I will say it was extremely difficult for me to renew for 2019. And I flew well in excess of 30 flights in 2018 but still couldn't get the spend levels in on account of booking so many discounted fares. And I've never gotten Mosaic with the 15,000 points option. So I really hope they are not going to raise the tiers. Had I been able to do all of my 2018 travel on B6, it would have been a different story but I always have trips to/from various cities in the Midwest or intra West Coast where B6 is of no use to me. Great for Chicago but not much else.

Re: London. I'm excited to be able to fly JetBlue across the pond and will look to be on the inaugural for this one. But I agree the announcement was underwhelming, especially with a 2 year lead time and no solid execution plan internally yet aside from the aircraft. Before you argue with me, I have connections too. Anyway, I fully expect Delta and AA to respond accordingly and proactively to this since they are already in market. I think business travelers will give this a shot to try it out but whether they adopt and convert remains to be seen.

sfozrhfco

A. They will have a differentiated product. Isn't that the whole point of this exercise? If they were going to be flying beat up 747s with no leg room they would be BA...lol

B. As they have mentioned many, many times, they are not a connecting airline. Very few people connect and having a narrow body flying on a very busy route is not the same as having an A380. They may get a connecting passenger but they are not planning on that. The routes will succeed or fail with O/D traffic. They are not doing route planning/profitability studies looking to get somebody from SMF to LON. That would be crazy.

tphuang

My thoughts on this.
Not a surprise we need to wait 18mo to 2 yr. That's what B6 has said all along.

They didn't announce an airport, but I'm sure they are going to try everything to get LHR slots and I think they have a good chance of getting what they need. I don't really buy the notion of serving multiple London airports. At least not to start off.

B6 is a low cost carrier, but not a low fare carrier. I'm sure legacies will match them. They do it domestically out of JFK/BOS and B6 can still fill the planes. On many of the mint routes like JFK-SAN/BOS-LAX, they are the highest yielding carrier. They are the only airline making money on these BOS transcon due to pricing power and low cost.

So for the analysts who have said legacies taking losses will somehow make it too hard for B6, since they have 2 years head start. They have really not seen the numbers on mint transcon out of BOS. BOS-LAX/SFO are the two most competitive and costly transcon routes domestically. Everyone looses money except B6 on those 2 routes. I can provide the numbers if people don't believe me. Both are about system average in performance. I see BOS-LON looking about the same long term. BA will still dominate this route and make money. DL/VS will have a hard time, but they will stick around and take their losses. DY might not be around by then. B6 will settle in and do okay (nothing spectacular). On JFK-LON, they won't capture the highest yielding client, but they will be able to win over the high yielding leisure flyers and also be competitive for non-C-Suite corporate travelers. If they fly 3 or 4x daily on this route, there is no way someone my level or even one level about me can avoid having them show up in the search results on corporate travel account. There is no shortage of people willing to pay $2500 R/T in J bw NYC-LON. And they should be able to do pretty well on that.

The TATL J fares are way too outrageous compared to TPAC, Latin America and domestic. It's about time B6 comes in and drop it a bunch.

N830MH

Unfortunately, no. I don't think they go for LHR. Due to slot controlled and it's very extremely expensive. I think they will go to STN or LCY. Whatever if they choose. They won't know for sure.

MSYtoJFKagain

They can't fly out of London City with an A321LR.

My money is on Gatwick.