hi55us

Good decision by Jet Blue, but Jet Blue needs to add more secondary markets on the West Coast to be competitive. Alaska is teaming up with AA and joining OW, which means on a route like LAX-AUS/RNO/SLC/SEA, you're totally relying on O&D traffic, wheras the US3 can offer a routing like FAT-LAX-AUS, SAN-LAX-RNO, PHX-LAX-RNO.

On the East Coast Jet Blue has this advantage, being able to fly you say BUF-JFK-MCO or BTV-JFK-CHS. Having secondary cities on both ends would make their transcons and midcon routes significantly more successful and make LAX a true "focus city" that honestly it isn't given the current news of 6 Cities to be served out of LAX. You have Delta serving 13 west coast markets, United serving 24 west coast markets and AA/Alaska serving 19 west coast markets. The US3 will be able to pressure Jet Blue on price on a route like JFK-LAX, charging say $149 for Y while Jet Blue charges $189 and not lose their shirt because they're selling FAT-LAX-JFK tickets for $250.

N830MH

Yes, it is! LGB is a slot restricted. They don't like to flying after 10pm. Southwest will gets extra slots. They can bring more nonstop flight.

DLSuites

Good decision? To go into a market that is oversaturated? And before folks chime in that AA, DL and AS are going to shrink and cough up gates to B6...its time to be realistic about matters. Or you can believe the hype that B6 is taking over JFK/BOS/LAX/FLL/MCO/PHL and I've got a bridge to sell you. B6 will have very limited success with LAX. Fact: the routes B6 will fly out of LAX are not impressive, are flown by everyone under the sun and will not impress the LAX constituents. The exception will be the MINT flights. They will absolutely do extremely well with that.

B6 would be better of trying to make inroads at SFO if they really want a presence on the west coast. They only have UA to compete with and I think there is enough of a San Fran market for JetBlue to co-exist with UA and to a lesser extent, AS. LAX, to much competition. I mean, who at B6 thinks of these things? They also should've made a play a SEA long before DL moved in. With the way B6 manages their future, I am afraid it doesnt look to bright, They always seem to be a few steps behind the competition. Think about it for a minute...In the not to distant past they could've been 2nd in charge at SEA, they could easily be 2nd in charge at SFO, but they choose LAX, a market that is beyond saturated with the flights they plan on running. Not. To. Smart.

cmd320

They might, however they still don't have the depth of the networks AS and UA have on the west coast. I don't really consider SLC a west coast hub. People flying SAN-PDX for example aren't going to want to transfer in SLC under most circumstances.

AA already has begun to shrink LAX.

Can you reference this "fact" anywhere?

I disagree. SFO is too heavily UA centric for another airline to have any kind of sizable operation there. While other airlines such as AA, DL, and B6 have success on their transcon routes from SFO, that's about all that is supported in addition to routes to their hubs. Competitive cities that lack an established player are actually very beneficial to the LCC business model because LCCs can undercut legacies on price in most cases. LAX plays right into this and also is a major leisure destination.

tphuang

Basically, you are saying that they should run more of a hub model in a place like LAX. That does go against the current JetBlue model. Although with their network consolidated in one place, they should be able to connect more than they have been.

I do have to correct you one thing. Having looked a connection data and done my own prorated analysis, I have found O&D fares on average to always be higher than connection fares. Connection does help an airline fill seats, which allow them to offer more frequencies and attract higher yielding close-in bookings.

I get the sense that you don't quite understand what works for JetBlue. LAX has always been the west coast hub they wanted since mint became a success. And now they will have enough gate space thanks to legacy cutbacks. Again, we will have to see where the gate space comes from. If a lot of adds won't come until 2023, that might indicate they won't have the extra gate access until that time. Or it might just be due to the need to concentrate on East coast for the next 2 years.

JetBlue will have more departure and higher ASM than NK after they consolidate at LAX. So they will be #6 in LAX. They have a chance to be #5 in revenue/ASM if they get to 70 flights a day. A220 will probably be used for long thin transcon like to BDL, PBI, HPN, JAX, CHS, RSW that currently have no competition of will have no competition. All of these markets should have similar level of demand to BUF.

N830MH

Yes, they will. They will shrinks LAX flight.

RWPrincess

As someone who spends a lot of money on JetBlue annually and has been Mosaic for several years now, this hurts from a passenger experience perspective. My clients and business needs were located within 30 miles of LGB and rarely was there traffic.I also had non-freeway alternatives if needed. Car rental was easy at LGB as was other ground transport. It was also cheaper to utilize ground transport at LGB due to the shorter distance. Last time I took an Uber at LAX, I had to wait almost 20 min just to travel from the parking lot to the freeway entrance because of congestion.

There is nothing good about LAX from a passenger experience perspective. You can't even do quality planespotting from T5 because of the lack of windows. If you don't believe me, run a twitter search for JetBlue LGB and look at all the negative comments from passengers.

I get the business reasons for this but I can't see this being successful long term. Casual passengers will just switch to other airlines at LGB and more frequent passengers now have a choice. I'm not a regular Mint customer so to me, JetBlue is now just like everyone else. I'm also someone that needs the SoCal-PDX route which JetBlue quietly removed with this announcement so that's more of a reason for me to seriously consider Delta. I would have said Southwest but they'll never offer nonstop service to LGB from cities I need on the East Coast.

nsx

The city of Long Beach won't have jetBlue to kick around anymore. Maybe the city will learn its lesson and treat its remaining airlines better. Nah, who am I kidding...

I hope jetBlue can inject some fare competition into Southwest's monopoly on LAX-OAK service. In recent years LAX-OAK fares have been higher than LAX-SJC and LAX-SFO fares. The latter routes had competitors, primarily Alaska Airlines.

GW McLintock

Bad news... JetBlue does not fly to Oakland anymore (from anywhere!).

I had heard that Southwest aggressively chased Mosaics in the OAK area after JetBlue pulled out. Rumor or not, they once again have this opportunity in Long Beach.

-J.

ucdtim17

I doubt they’ll be back in OAK anytime soon. AS or UA probably would have been candidates to try LAX-OAK in the alternate non-pandemic timeline, but now it’ll probably just be WN (and NK) for the foreseeable future.

sbm12

WN would likely argue that, particularly its intra-California network.

And DL is growing, but we'll have to see how it comes out of the current draw-down and where demand is.

cmd320

That's fair, I honestly forget WN even exists most of the time.

GW McLintock

Rumor has it... Delta wants to grow. SLC was already mainline for some frequencies (pre-COVID). I could see SEA and MSP easily if they get enough slots. But I heard they are evaluating JFK. If they start JFK-LGB, I could easily see a lot of the former B6 flyers jumping ship (and definitely the employees, too).

-J.

cmd320

If that were to happen, what equipment? Just move a 75E over from LAX?

GW McLintock

For JFK? I doubt it would be a D1-equipped aircraft, as LGB is definitely not a premium destination. I could see an A319 or even an A220 doing it pretty successfully. I think a 73G would have been perfect given its higher performance, but that requires a 73G being made available at JFK.

-J.