Dn10

OMAAT commenter mentioned that it'll be announced at the May investor day. Anyone else hearing anything on this?

steveholt

The OMAAT says that news about this is "rumored to be announced" at the investor day. This is now a rumor about a rumor from a blog commenter.

fly747first

Yeah and like Ben has actually worked for an airline and boasts such a vast network of people who actually respect him and tell him highly confidential things...

tkey75

Dunno if that's snark or not but he's never worked for an airline tho you're correct, he is quite connected, respected and usually right.

That said, his article is more about why they should have first class and not that they will (maybe). The rumor was from a commentor.

GW McLintock

It's been discussed in the past and has been more recently. That's all I know. It would make sense given their new desire to shrink (In Reversal of Growth Strategy, JetBlue Aims to Shrink, Offers Employee Buyouts) as it would allow them to put fewer seats on the plane. If they got rid of three Y rows and added two F rows, that would put them at 152 (and if they got rid of two rows and put in one F row, 154). If they can get to 150 or fewer seats, they can drop down to three FAs, but that would require extensive recertification. They also just bumped up from 150 seats to 162 over the last several years -- would it really make sense to keep flip-flopping? There are 150-seat planes still flying around, but for crew planning simplicity they now get four FAs even though they used to require three in the unchanged configuration.

-J.

fly747first

So, so, sooooo respected that his own readers write things like "Ben, you have very poor analytical skills" but hey, apparently Oman Air loves him and treats him well after a downgrade! NOT lol

Bottom line, as much as I would love for B6 to expand Mint, there is no proof as of now that B6 will actually do it.

sfozrhfco

There is no desire to shrink. The airline is still going to be growing—-but obviously with no Spirit acquisition they are not going to be growing as fast as expected. The most obvious place to start would be the A220s which open up more profitable flying on longer routes that can’t be served by the E190s. Adding a few first class seats would make a lot of sense. The new A321s are already being delivered in Mint. They are not taking any new A320s and are starting to retire the older ones. Getting rid of the rest of the E190s and offering a premium product on the brand new A220s would make a lot of sense.

Masterofpuppets

First Class? Will they serve meals? Do the 320's have ovens? Can the non mint 320s even cater for any kind of food???

GW McLintock

The only aircraft with ovens are the Mint aircraft. So if they wish to serve any meal it will either be a cold meal (which they already, to an extent, offer with the fresh food for sale) or they will have to put an oven in the forward galley. Where it would be placed, I have no idea, as most space is currently utilized. They'd have to take out at least one Atlas bins (two if they want to use the same ovens as on the Mint aircraft, one if they want to source and buy mini-ovens) and then train every non-Mint Service/Onboard Lead-qualified FA on how to use it (or train everyone on the new mini-ovens, if they go that route).

I could totally see them doing cold food and free booze along with maybe the Hu Hunks or whatever the Mint "sweet treat" is (or whatever they can get on sale at 7-11) these days. Remember when they had Mah-Ze-Dahr? The good ol' days!!!

I think the biggest risk of them doing this is when a Mint flight gets swapped to a Core aircraft, so if it has F seats then that's "less of a downgrade" -- so they can lower the compensation. I feel like this happens often enough these days that it may be a consideration.

-J.

Masterofpuppets

If the aim is to compete more with the legacies, be on par or better, warm/hot meals will be essential. Being that the 320 fleet just went through a cabin refresh, it'll be interesting to see how this play out.

diburning

Many years ago, they explored the idea of a domestic first class (the running name for the market study was "Junior Mint") but they couldn't make the numbers work financially. However, with all travel patterns after 2020 being uncharted territory, and the current market seems to tend to skew toward premium leisure travel (people who are traveling for leisure are willing to pay a bit more for more comfort) perhaps maybe it makes sense now?

Masterofpuppets

MINT Jr is a possibly, but what will they do for a meal service? From what I read up thread, the A320 CORE planes don't have ovens nor galleys that will handle cold meals? So how will meals work? They are still in the process of upgrading the 320 CORE planes so this will be interesting if they do go to a MINT Jr. configuration

diburning

It’s also very possible that a second cabin refresh is coming. Of the un-refreshed A320s, they bought out two of the leases two quarters ago. Either they’re using them as parts, or they decided to keep them (in which case, I don’t think they’d want to keep them in the classic config)

Also, the 200-seat A321ceos and the Classic Mint A321s are due for a refresh as well.

soy

Perhaps they do not need meals to do Mint Jr. , just because that is traditionally done does not mean it always has to be that way.
F meals on AA/DL/UA are not great in any case

GW McLintock

They already have fresh food on many of the flights, and it would be a matter of reconfiguring how they load the carts. There's no reason they can't do meals on an A320 Everything is modular.

My thoughts exactly. I think it will be comp fresh food and alcohol, and maybe a special "sweet treat" that's loaded in a bag. Domestic F is nothing special these days so the bar is pretty low.

-J.