JetBlue is not dropping DTW. It's too important of a market out of BOS and they actually make money on it! In fact, it's their best performing route to DL fortress hubs out of BOS. If they drop DTW, they might as well drop JFK-ORH, BOS-ATL/MSP and forget about the corporate clients they have worked so hard to get.

From a Geographical point of view they seemed to focus on the Eastern U.S. with this big round of changes. It would be logical if another round of more West Coast based changes is announced next. and of course Europe

New schedule out today any major adjustments besides what was announced?

Flyguy

Seems like BOS-RSW will have 2 daily 321, and BOS-PBI/AUA/DEN at 1 daily. BOS-AUA on selected days has 321 all core and 321 Mint as well AND 320, so up to 3 times a day.
Also it seems that BOS-SDQ will be getting 321 all core for a certain period. And BOS-STI will be twice daily.

wnflyguy wrote:

New schedule out today any major adjustments besides what was announced?

Flyguy

PDX-ANC isn’t on it.

June is a half load so that means BTV is still at 3

Per OAG BOS-CHS/SAV/PHL and JFK-LAX/MSY pick up flights (not mentioned in the route network adjustment from this past week).

BOSCHS - 2x E90/1x A320
BOSSAV - 2x A320
BOSPHL - 7x E90 (DL reaction?)
JFKLAX - 11x Mint (flown temporarily this past year, remains to be seen if it sticks)
JFKMSY - 1x E90/2x A320/1x A321

jetbluefan1 wrote:

Per OAG BOS-CHS/SAV/PHL and JFK-LAX/MSY pick up flights (not mentioned in the route network adjustment from this past week).

BOSCHS - 2x E90/1x A320
BOSSAV - 2x A320
BOSPHL - 7x E90 (DL reaction?)
JFKLAX - 11x Mint (flown temporarily this past year, remains to be seen if it sticks)
JFKMSY - 1x E90/2x A320/1x A321

7 flights to phl.....wow
Looks like they are digging in at the hubs

spinkid wrote:

From a Geographical point of view they seemed to focus on the Eastern U.S. with this big round of changes. It would be logical if another round of more West Coast based changes is announced next. and of course Europe

Jetblue is an east coast centric airline so this shouldn't be so surprising.

Wow, JFK-MSY go from twice a day to 4 times a day. Huge jump in capacity.

Things that i see from OAG.
AUA-BOS - up to 3 times a day in winter month (including one A321)
JFK-BDA - down to once a day for May/June. Not a surprise here imo, given the low LF on this route.
BOS-BUF - down to 4 a day on the thread, but I still see 5 a day on google/jetblue.com
JFK-CUN - Up to 3 a day for May/June
JFK-ACK - starting earlier this year
BDL - MCO up to 3 a day, PBI up to twice a day up until mid may.
BGI - BOS starts earlier and JFK up slightly.
NAS - up one daily for both BOS/JFK
BOS-CLE - Not really listed, but it looks like this is going to 4 a day.
BOS-LAS - 4 per day in May/June. Maybe this will be the summer time frequency going forward.
BOS-MCO - up to 7 a day (still 4 A321s)
BOS-PBI - up to 8 a day on some days in March/April
BOS-PHL - up to 7 a day (i'd imagine dl response)
BOS-SAN/SEA - down to twice a day for all month
BOS-SDQ/STI/SJU - higher capacity here across several months
BOS-SRQ - more flights in Jan/Feb, probably DL response
BOS-TPA - one more flight a day across most months, probably aimed at DL also
DCA - one flight moved from CHS to RSW
EWR - a lot of trims in May/June
FLL-PHL - down to once a day in May/June
FLL-SDQ - going to twice daily
HPN - added a flight to PBI. Not sure where the slot is from
JFK-KIN - up to 3 times daily
JFK-MCO - added a frequency, maybe from DAB?
JFK-ORD - down to twice daily in May/June
JFK-ROC - down to twice daily, i assume this is due to BOS-ROC add
JFK-SDQ/STI - both up one or two flights daily, not surprising here
JFK-TPA - up once daily

a mix bag.

Seems the LGB-BOS redeye goes less than daily... or was that already reduced?

flymco753 wrote:

B6 COULD add DTW-JFK, but they won't. They MIGHT add DTW-MCO, but I'm not holding my breath. DTW is becoming a station where B6 has to push a boulder up hill. BOS isn't performing all that well either. The only reason they keep it is EK connections. You bet once DTW gets EK, B6 is out.

If that is the case, then why do they operate 3 daily flights? Why not offer a single daily flight timed for connections both ways? The amount of connecting traffic B6 carries for EK doesn't even fill up half of one of their A320s.

More numbers from BOS in Q2

CityPair Dist CarrierBoard AvgFare NSFare ConnFare % NS SeatPerFlight LF Yield PRASM Vs B6
BOSPHL 280 AA 254090 167.6 167.48 377.67 99.95% 160.0 84.87% 142.15 0.5077 114.06%
BOSPHL 280 B6 78981 159.06 159.06 N/A 100.00% 103.0 78.35% 124.63 0.4451 100.00%
Pretty good numbers here actually for B6. Its numbers crept up a little bit against AA YoY. You will notice that yield to PHL is higher than to BWI despite being a shorter flight. Certainly warrants the extra frequency given the DL add and the performance here.

BOSPIT 496 9E 18293 114.66 113.45 135.85 94.59% 76.00 73.88% 83.81 0.169 77.55%
BOSPIT 496 B6 83286 135.48 135.48 N/A 100.00% 100.8 79.78% 108.08 0.2179 100.00%
BOSPIT 496 MQ 15077 140.43 140.33 141.59 92.03% 44.10 77.43% 108.65 0.2191 100.53%
Huge bloodbath. Both B6 and AA regional MQ here down close to 1/3 in yield YoY. If this was one of B6's top 5 most profitable routes, it certainly isn't the case anymore. My guess is that they are probably still breaking even outside of Q1. This is probably the worst performing of the DL adds. I took a look at all the routes with DL and DL regional numbers out of a wide range of routes I follow, there is nothing that even comes close to how bad this route is performing (outside of maybe BOSBUF). I can't see DL keeping this around for another year if this doesn't improve dramatically.

BOSRDU 612 9E 21704 200.08 198.88 679.73 99.75% 76.00 85.52% 170.08 0.2779 106.81%
BOSRDU 612 B6 81674 185.8 185.8 N/A 100.00% 103.7 85.70% 159.23 0.2602 100.00%
BOSRDU 612 DL 35985 182.49 181.36 422.9 99.53% 110.0 80.99% 146.88 0.2400 92.24%
BOSRDU 612 G7 9792 209.68 209.29 318.3 99.65% 71.70 86.38% 180.79 0.2954 113.53%
BOSRDU 612 OO 6710 213.35 212.65 415.47 99.65% 76.00 90.09% 191.58 0.313 120.31%

This is a little confusing. Basically, all the non-B6 stuff are DL. Looks like a bit of upgauging here by DL YoY. B6 numbers are down slightly. DL did not have mainline here last year. It's regional is up slightly and mainline is underperforming. B6 upped to 6 daily for Q3, so would be interesting to see this continues to hold.

BOSRIC 474 B6 58445 150.4 150.4 N/A 100.00% 101.3 82.78% 124.5 0.2627 100.00%
BOSRIC 474 EV 12707 152.03 151.74 264.94 99.74% 65.00 81.80% 124.11 0.2618 99.69%
BOSRIC 474 G7 12898 155.29 155.29 N/A 100.00% 70.10 78.35% 121.67 0.2567 97.73%
One of the few routes with little changes YoY. B6 still has slight yield advantage here against DL's small regionals.

BOSMSP 1124 B6 41969 112.43 112.43 N/A 100.00% 150.5 79.23% 89.08 0.0793 100.00%
BOSMSP 1124 DL 146468 202.61 199.19 376.92 98.07% 165.6 88.37% 176.03 0.1566 197.59%
BOSMSP 1124 NK 16664 49.71 49.22 73.35 98.00% 146.3 72.08% 35.48 0.0316 39.83%
BOSMSP 1124 SY 41013 108.28 108.28 N/A 100.00% 161.9 76.52% 82.85 0.0737 93.01%
Tough new market to get into. Not bad LF, but the average fare numbers are not great. Comparable to when they first entered ATL. Would be interesting to see Q3 numbers. DL and SY fares were at $300 and $200 respectively a year ago. So very big fall when considering that B6 only affected probably 60% of Q2.

tphuang wrote:

More numbers from BOS in Q2

CityPair Dist CarrierBoard AvgFare NSFare ConnFare % NS SeatPerFlight LF Yield PRASM Vs B6
BOSPHL 280 AA 254090 167.6 167.48 377.67 99.95% 160.0 84.87% 142.15 0.5077 114.06%
BOSPHL 280 B6 78981 159.06 159.06 N/A 100.00% 103.0 78.35% 124.63 0.4451 100.00%
Pretty good numbers here actually for B6. Its numbers crept up a little bit against AA YoY. You will notice that yield to PHL is higher than to BWI despite being a shorter flight. Certainly warrants the extra frequency given the DL add and the performance here.

It would be interesting to see how much is BOS vs PHL POS considering B6 is most likely all local traffic in both directions.

Is BOS-ORD being cut back??

Dieuwer wrote:

Is BOS-ORD being cut back??

nope, they are committed to increasing that to 5 a day. in fact, they are keeping JFK-ORD 2 a day even in summer to have enough gate space for BOS-ORD. JFK-ORD will just be upgauged to A320s for the busy months.

The biggest one might just be FLL-GYE. 1 year ago, AA was the only US carrier serving the airport, flying to MIA. Fast forward a year and NK is flying to FLL and B6 has announced FLL. GYE is getting some nice US adds, even if it is to the same city. New airlines are always big for airports.

tphuang wrote:

Dieuwer wrote:

Is BOS-ORD being cut back??

nope, they are committed to increasing that to 5 a day. in fact, they are keeping JFK-ORD 2 a day even in summer to have enough gate space for BOS-ORD. JFK-ORD will just be upgauged to A320s for the busy months.

I see. Well, I'm not thrilled with their schedule.

Airline Weekly has story about why market is pessimist about JetBlue.

They say reasons to worry:

o Declining Op margin - one of the biggest YoY declines worldwide in Q2
o Weaker than expected ancillary revenues
o Historically profitable Caribbean and Mexico beach markets weaker
o Rising fuel cost
o Yield weakness esp on West Coast
o Fast rising maintenance cost
o Labor cost spike
o Messy/inefficient operation
o Over dependence on Northeast
o Escalating competition at key markets - DL @ BOS, NK/WN @ FLL

tphuang wrote:

Dieuwer wrote:

Is BOS-ORD being cut back??

nope, they are committed to increasing that to 5 a day. in fact, they are keeping JFK-ORD 2 a day even in summer to have enough gate space for BOS-ORD. JFK-ORD will just be upgauged to A320s for the busy months.[/quot

Same old jetblue garbage story. They usually fly four or five daily to JFK in the summer and they are packed. And now because they don’t have the resources at O’Hare they’re down to two daily. Which makes them irrelevant. Just like they are irrelevant in Dallas. Just like they are irrelevant in Washington Dulles. Just like they are irrelevant in Houston. And the five daily to BOS Still makes them barely relevant on that route.

If JetBlue wants to play with the big boys, they have to commit the resources to run an operation. So when Chicago came to them with the second gate offer, they shouldnt have turned it down like they did.

They keep making themselves irrelevant in too many markets. 10 years of doing that and we’re starting to see the chickens come home to roost.

just remember this little tidbit about New York’s Hometown Airline… Starting in January, they can no longer fly you to Washington DC. That really says it all.

LAXintl wrote:

Airline Weekly has story about why market is pessimist about JetBlue.

They say reasons to worry:

o Declining Op margin - one of the biggest YoY declines worldwide in Q2
o Weaker than expected ancillary revenues
o Historically profitable Caribbean and Mexico beach markets weaker
o Rising fuel cost
o Yield weakness esp on West Coast
o Fast rising maintenance cost
o Labor cost spike
o Messy/inefficient operation
o Over dependence on Northeast
o Escalating competition at key markets - DL @ BOS, NK/WN @ FLL

Cant disagree with any of these points.

Some are simply market evolution while others are totally within B6 own making.
Regardless they need to come up with ways to manage all.

LAXintl wrote:

Airline Weekly has story about why market is pessimist about JetBlue.

They say reasons to worry:

o Declining Op margin - one of the biggest YoY declines worldwide in Q2
o Weaker than expected ancillary revenues
o Historically profitable Caribbean and Mexico beach markets weaker
o Rising fuel cost
o Yield weakness esp on West Coast
o Fast rising maintenance cost
o Labor cost spike
o Messy/inefficient operation
o Over dependence on Northeast
o Escalating competition at key markets - DL @ BOS, NK/WN @ FLL

Let's face it, the market only cares about the first one. If their op margin was good, nobody would care that they are facing competition or that they are dependent on NorthEast. AA has presence everywhere and their stock is getting slammed too because op margin is no good.

Latin America like all market is cyclical. They may be weak this quarter and hurt them, but they could be strong a year from now. I don't see how you can forecast a region to always be weak. Europe was weak several years ago and now it's printing money.

Competition at FLL is nothing new. They are doing well there. BOS is a problem now. If they don't keep building at these 2 place, they will fall behind. The airline industry is heading for a down cycle imo. It's no time to get too fancy and worry about how they do elsewhere.

LAXintl wrote:

o Escalating competition at key markets - DL @ BOS, NK/WN @ FLL

In addition to NK and WN focus cities at FLL, AA also has a hub at MIA in the Miami/Ft. Lauderdale area.

jfklganyc wrote:

just remember this little tidbit about New York’s Hometown Airline… Starting in January, they can no longer fly you to Washington DC. That really says it all.

No one whose final destination is inside the city limits (or the near northern Maryland suburbs/Arlington County) is flying via Dulles, located out in East Jesus, Virginia. They're flying into DCA, which JetBlue still serves from BOS and has never served from JFK/LGA. Basically all that's going away is the token presence on JFK-IAD -- so yes, JetBlue can no longer fly you 3x daily to the suburbs of Northern Virginia. Up next: bankruptcy!

AA94 wrote:

jfklganyc wrote:

just remember this little tidbit about New York’s Hometown Airline… Starting in January, they can no longer fly you to Washington DC. That really says it all.

No one whose final destination is inside the city limits (or the near northern Maryland suburbs/Arlington County) is flying via Dulles, located out in East Jesus, Virginia. They're flying into DCA, which JetBlue still serves from BOS and has never served from JFK/LGA. Basically all that's going away is the token presence on JFK-IAD -- so yes, JetBlue can no longer fly you 3x daily to the suburbs of Northern Virginia. Up next: bankruptcy!

You can still get to Washington, DC from Dulles, therefore you could still fly from New York to DC. Starting January 8th, you can't do it on jetBlue. He's still right.

jplatts wrote:

LAXintl wrote:

o Escalating competition at key markets - DL @ BOS, NK/WN @ FLL

In addition to NK and WN focus cities at FLL, AA also has a hub at MIA in the Miami/Ft. Lauderdale area.

AA has had a hub at MIA the whole time B6 has been at FLL. The other two are more influential because for a while it seemed B6 was chasing NK from FLL which didn't ultimately happen - once new airplane deliveries came in NK doubled-down on FLL. Also WN has begun several new routes in the last few years where B6 flew already from FLL. Both domestic and international. That's why it is more significant than AA's presence at MIA.

LAXintl wrote:

Airline Weekly has story about why market is pessimist about JetBlue.

They say reasons to worry:

o Declining Op margin - one of the biggest YoY declines worldwide in Q2
o Weaker than expected ancillary revenues
o Historically profitable Caribbean and Mexico beach markets weaker
o Rising fuel cost
o Yield weakness esp on West Coast
o Fast rising maintenance cost
o Labor cost spike
o Messy/inefficient operation
o Over dependence on Northeast
o Escalating competition at key markets - DL @ BOS, NK/WN @ FLL

Very interesting, and thanks for sharing!

Yeah, all of these points make complete sense.

Don't want to get too off topic, but with that being said, one could say the same thing for AS in terms of weakness on the east coast (although their yields there might be okay for now). Also AS's dependence on SEA is very noticeable as well, although they're wanting to expand in California...

B6 is the strongest airline by far in Boston, so I don't think there's too much to worry about on Delta encroaching on their network there, however Delta has wanted to add more out of BOS, so I guess we'll wait and see what they have planned in the future there.

B6's FLL network is very interesting, because there's not a ton of trans-con activity there (mainly just up and down the east coast from BOS, NYC and the like)... It definitely shows that they want to be competitive by adding MCO and FLL to SLC, a prominent Delta hub, which some people have attributed to as a response in Delta's expansion at BOS. With the rising fuel costs and thin markets, yields for FLL/MCO-West Coast market(s) would probably not generate much of a profit for them. Their recent announcement of FLL-PHX is surprising, and I'm not too optimistic of how this particular route will perform for them.

MIAFLLPBIFlyer wrote:

jplatts wrote:

LAXintl wrote:

o Escalating competition at key markets - DL @ BOS, NK/WN @ FLL

In addition to NK and WN focus cities at FLL, AA also has a hub at MIA in the Miami/Ft. Lauderdale area.

AA has had a hub at MIA the whole time B6 has been at FLL. The other two are more influential because for a while it seemed B6 was chasing NK from FLL which didn't ultimately happen - once new airplane deliveries came in NK doubled-down on FLL. Also WN has begun several new routes in the last few years where B6 flew already from FLL. Both domestic and international. That's why it is more significant than AA's presence at MIA.

But yet the funny thing is I’m pretty sure FLL is the most profitable hub right now. Again like Boston pretty much built up from nothing.

JetBlue can’t win they must grow in Boston and Fll but Wall St has a cow every time. To the point where Jamie Baker said why even grow. What happens if they don’t well someone else will take the flying. It’s like a viscous circle.

What we are seeing imho is JetBlue retrenching and focusing on growing its hubs and doing what it does best. Trans cons and North South/Caribbean. They are now adding much needed frequency and still have more 321 all core planes coming.

JetBlue is not dead far far from it but there is nothing wrong with identifying weak routes or stations and doing away with them.

In the end they are a NY airline (now Bos) flying to places those people want to go. It’s never going to have a massive route map it will most likely never have wide bodies, there is no express carrier to open small city’s with a flight a day there probably won’t be a large west coast operation, it just is what it is.

LAXintl wrote:

Airline Weekly has story about why market is pessimist about JetBlue.

They say reasons to worry:

o Declining Op margin - one of the biggest YoY declines worldwide in Q2
o Weaker than expected ancillary revenues
o Historically profitable Caribbean and Mexico beach markets weaker
o Rising fuel cost
o Yield weakness esp on West Coast
o Fast rising maintenance cost
o Labor cost spike
o Messy/inefficient operation
o Over dependence on Northeast
o Escalating competition at key markets - DL @ BOS, NK/WN @ FLL

There is more to that article FYI


To a glass-is-half-full optimist, JetBlue is doing just fine. In 2016, it outperformed even Southwest in terms of operating margin. In 2017, it came within a whisker of closing its once-gaping margin gap with Spirit. Today, JetBlue’s New York, Boston, Florida and transcon markets are all healthy. And unit revenues are rising.

tphuang wrote:

Things that i see from OAG.
BOS-CLE - Not really listed, but it looks like this is going to 4 a day.

Almost. The fourth flight will operate Sun, Mon, Thu, and Fri. only at least through June 12.

I wish they would add CLE-SJU at least once a week. There's a pretty big VFR market that UA decided to ignore this winter.

AA94 wrote:

jfklganyc wrote:

No one whose final destination is inside the city limits (or the near northern Maryland suburbs/Arlington County) is flying via Dulles, located out in East Jesus, Virginia. They're flying into DCA, which JetBlue still serves from BOS and has never served from JFK/LGA. Basically all that's going away is the token presence on JFK-IAD -- so yes, JetBlue can no longer fly you 3x daily to the suburbs of Northern Virginia. Up next: bankruptcy!

Yeah, I think the impact from New York is minimal to none. The impact is more from DC. As much as IAD is a haul from downtown, I could make the trip if I wanted to fly B6 IAD-JFK-final destination. There's some destinations B6 doesn't serve from BOS (BTV, for example), making a connection in JFK mandatory. And BOS is just too far out of the way to make connections to most places west of DC. Flying IAD-JFK-PHX or IAD-JFK-SEA was not too bad. BOS is just too far away to make that a reasonable connection. Same with flying DCA-FLL/MCO-West. Flying to south/central America or the Caribbean does make sense out of MCO/FLL.

I think from a business perspective pulling out of IAD was a smart move, it just cuts the DC region off from much of B6's route network.

Honeymoon is over JetBlue. You're no longer an upstart with many of the cost benefits.

LAXintl wrote:

Airline Weekly has story about why market is pessimist about JetBlue.

They say reasons to worry:

o Declining Op margin - one of the biggest YoY declines worldwide in Q2
o Weaker than expected ancillary revenues
o Historically profitable Caribbean and Mexico beach markets weaker
o Rising fuel cost
o Yield weakness esp on West Coast
o Fast rising maintenance cost
o Labor cost spike
o Messy/inefficient operation
o Over dependence on Northeast
o Escalating competition at key markets - DL @ BOS, NK/WN @ FLL

Agree on all accounts.

masseybrown wrote:

Almost. The fourth flight will operate Sun, Mon, Thu, and Fri. only at least through June 12.

I wish they would add CLE-SJU at least once a week. There's a pretty big VFR market that UA decided to ignore this winter.

Thanks fore correcting me. I often make the mistake of only checking Monday and Fridays. I doubt they will add CLE-SJU, because SJU yields have been pretty bad since the hurricane last year. I will have some SJU numbers out later.

fastmover wrote:

There is more to that article FYI


To a glass-is-half-full optimist, JetBlue is doing just fine. In 2016, it outperformed even Southwest in terms of operating margin. In 2017, it came within a whisker of closing its once-gaping margin gap with Spirit. Today, JetBlue’s New York, Boston, Florida and transcon markets are all healthy. And unit revenues are rising.

market sure is funny. Just one quarter earlier, airlineweekly was heaping praise on B6 for catching up and even exceeding operating margin of NK. B6 is going to go through a couple of quarters of tough reports because the market it operates in are just having bad quarters. They are not getting weaker in them. And the rising fuel prices probably hurt them more than anyone else, but the network changes will boost their results.

fastmover wrote:

But yet the funny thing is I’m pretty sure FLL is the most profitable hub right now. Again like Boston pretty much built up from nothing.

JetBlue can’t win they must grow in Boston and Fll but Wall St has a cow every time. To the point where Jamie Baker said why even grow. What happens if they don’t well someone else will take the flying. It’s like a viscous circle.

What we are seeing imho is JetBlue retrenching and focusing on growing its hubs and doing what it does best. Trans cons and North South/Caribbean. They are now adding much needed frequency and still have more 321 all core planes coming.

JetBlue is not dead far far from it but there is nothing wrong with identifying weak routes or stations and doing away with them.

In the end they are a NY airline (now Bos) flying to places those people want to go. It’s never going to have a massive route map it will most likely never have wide bodies, there is no express carrier to open small city’s with a flight a day there probably won’t be a large west coast operation, it just is what it is.

Agreed 100%. FLL might be their biggest success story recently. Not every step they take will be the right one and they've certainly made their share of mistakes. But given the current operating environment, it seems like they are going to have to fund growth with cuts elsewhere. This quarter, Latin America was weak, so they will probably not do great. But long term, they are adding to where they are good at. We'd all like them to fly more in the west coast or into middle of the country, but it cost a lot of resource to do that. Resources that need to go toward solidifying their biggest 3 focus cities. They have space to grow at BOS and FLL. At JFK, they have cut a bunch of E90 flights and replaced them with destinations like MSY and Carribeans that will be operated by A320/321. I see that ORD is going to all A320s next summer and RDU is even getting 1/2 flights replaced with A320. That's the only way they can add capacity to JFK. They are growing in terms of flight and capacity at JFK this year.

It stinks to cut IAD completely, cut BWI/DTW/PIT-FLL and for JFK-ORD to be down to 2 flights a day, but they need to solidfying their focus cities first. Once that's solidified, then they can make more aggressive moves. All the airlines are going cut back growth signficantly. And there will be a lot of opportunity down the line for B6 as long as their core cities are really profitable.

This is what DL does really well. They completely dominate their fortress hubs. And then when they engage in hugely expensive market share battles at SEA and BOS, none of the wall street guys care, because their overall bottom line is still great. AA doesn't do that well outside of CLT/DFW and now that have to keep cutting to their hubs and still get their stocks smashed. If B6 can get to 35% market share at BOS and 30% market share at FLL, they will be really profitable in those places. If AA gives up some of its JFK slot, B6 should try to get more slots. If JFK slot goes away, that's even better. The terminal expansion at JFK is a great opportunity for them. And if they can get EWR gates with the new terminal opening, they should. Even 2 or 3 more gates would make them quite relevant at EWR. And I think it's great thing they are adding to PBI/BDL/PVD. They should continue to strengthen secondary airports near their primary focus cities. That will only increase their relevance there.

Until they finish with NYC/BOS/South Beach, MCO expansion will be put to hold. Even if they were to get 3 more gates at both LAX and SFO right now, they wouldn't know what to do with them.

I think more gates at LAX would even take priority over the hubs at this point.

They have to get out from under LGB. They need a place in LAX to put that operation.

I cant underscore enough how pressing this is to B6 now...even if they are not advertising it.

tphuang wrote:

masseybrown wrote:

Almost. The fourth flight will operate Sun, Mon, Thu, and Fri. only at least through June 12.

I wish they would add CLE-SJU at least once a week. There's a pretty big VFR market that UA decided to ignore this winter.

Thanks fore correcting me. I often make the mistake of only checking Monday and Fridays. I doubt they will add CLE-SJU, because SJU yields have been pretty bad since the hurricane last year. I will have some SJU numbers out later.

fastmover wrote:

There is more to that article FYI


To a glass-is-half-full optimist, JetBlue is doing just fine. In 2016, it outperformed even Southwest in terms of operating margin. In 2017, it came within a whisker of closing its once-gaping margin gap with Spirit. Today, JetBlue’s New York, Boston, Florida and transcon markets are all healthy. And unit revenues are rising.

market sure is funny. Just one quarter earlier, airlineweekly was heaping praise on B6 for catching up and even exceeding operating margin of NK. B6 is going to go through a couple of quarters of tough reports because the market it operates in are just having bad quarters. They are not getting weaker in them. And the rising fuel prices probably hurt them more than anyone else, but the network changes will boost their results.

fastmover wrote:

But yet the funny thing is I’m pretty sure FLL is the most profitable hub right now. Again like Boston pretty much built up from nothing.

JetBlue can’t win they must grow in Boston and Fll but Wall St has a cow every time. To the point where Jamie Baker said why even grow. What happens if they don’t well someone else will take the flying. It’s like a viscous circle.

What we are seeing imho is JetBlue retrenching and focusing on growing its hubs and doing what it does best. Trans cons and North South/Caribbean. They are now adding much needed frequency and still have more 321 all core planes coming.

JetBlue is not dead far far from it but there is nothing wrong with identifying weak routes or stations and doing away with them.

In the end they are a NY airline (now Bos) flying to places those people want to go. It’s never going to have a massive route map it will most likely never have wide bodies, there is no express carrier to open small city’s with a flight a day there probably won’t be a large west coast operation, it just is what it is.

Agreed 100%. FLL might be their biggest success story recently. Not every step they take will be the right one and they've certainly made their share of mistakes. But given the current operating environment, it seems like they are going to have to fund growth with cuts elsewhere. This quarter, Latin America was weak, so they will probably not do great. But long term, they are adding to where they are good at. We'd all like them to fly more in the west coast or into middle of the country, but it cost a lot of resource to do that. Resources that need to go toward solidifying their biggest 3 focus cities. They have space to grow at BOS and FLL. At JFK, they have cut a bunch of E90 flights and replaced them with destinations like MSY and Carribeans that will be operated by A320/321. I see that ORD is going to all A320s next summer and RDU is even getting 1/2 flights replaced with A320. That's the only way they can add capacity to JFK. They are growing in terms of flight and capacity at JFK this year.

It stinks to cut IAD completely, cut BWI/DTW/PIT-FLL and for JFK-ORD to be down to 2 flights a day, but they need to solidfying their focus cities first. Once that's solidified, then they can make more aggressive moves. All the airlines are going cut back growth signficantly. And there will be a lot of opportunity down the line for B6 as long as their core cities are really profitable.

This is what DL does really well. They completely dominate their fortress hubs. And then when they engage in hugely expensive market share battles at SEA and BOS, none of the wall street guys care, because their overall bottom line is still great. AA doesn't do that well outside of CLT/DFW and now that have to keep cutting to their hubs and still get their stocks smashed. If B6 can get to 35% market share at BOS and 30% market share at FLL, they will be really profitable in those places. If AA gives up some of its JFK slot, B6 should try to get more slots. If JFK slot goes away, that's even better. The terminal expansion at JFK is a great opportunity for them. And if they can get EWR gates with the new terminal opening, they should. Even 2 or 3 more gates would make them quite relevant at EWR. And I think it's great thing they are adding to PBI/BDL/PVD. They should continue to strengthen secondary airports near their primary focus cities. That will only increase their relevance there.

Until they finish with NYC/BOS/South Beach, MCO expansion will be put to hold. Even if they were to get 3 more gates at both LAX and SFO right now, they wouldn't know what to do with them.

I think you are spot on.
I expect things to go down before they come back.
But I’m not overly worried. Meanwhile on airliners.net it will be the end of JetBlue everyday

jfklganyc wrote:

I think more gates at LAX would even take priority over the hubs at this point.

They have to get out from under LGB. They need a place in LAX to put that operation.

I cant underscore enough how pressing this is to B6 now...even if they are not advertising it.

Totally agree
They are done with lgb

jfklganyc wrote:

I think more gates at LAX would even take priority over the hubs at this point.

They have to get out from under LGB. They need a place in LAX to put that operation.

I cant underscore enough how pressing this is to B6 now...even if they are not advertising it.

I agree 100% with wanting more gates at LAX, my question would be do they continue to fly west coast stuff from LAX? SEA-LAX, PDX-LAX, LAS-LAX etc.

They get three or four more gates at LAX and you can kiss LGB goodbye. They recently insourced ramp work at LAX and would have no problem convincing LGB crew members to hightail it up the street to support the LAX ops.

fastmover wrote:

tphuang wrote:

masseybrown wrote:

Almost. The fourth flight will operate Sun, Mon, Thu, and Fri. only at least through June 12.

I wish they would add CLE-SJU at least once a week. There's a pretty big VFR market that UA decided to ignore this winter.

Thanks fore correcting me. I often make the mistake of only checking Monday and Fridays. I doubt they will add CLE-SJU, because SJU yields have been pretty bad since the hurricane last year. I will have some SJU numbers out later.

fastmover wrote:

There is more to that article FYI


To a glass-is-half-full optimist, JetBlue is doing just fine. In 2016, it outperformed even Southwest in terms of operating margin. In 2017, it came within a whisker of closing its once-gaping margin gap with Spirit. Today, JetBlue’s New York, Boston, Florida and transcon markets are all healthy. And unit revenues are rising.

market sure is funny. Just one quarter earlier, airlineweekly was heaping praise on B6 for catching up and even exceeding operating margin of NK. B6 is going to go through a couple of quarters of tough reports because the market it operates in are just having bad quarters. They are not getting weaker in them. And the rising fuel prices probably hurt them more than anyone else, but the network changes will boost their results.

fastmover wrote:

But yet the funny thing is I’m pretty sure FLL is the most profitable hub right now. Again like Boston pretty much built up from nothing.

JetBlue can’t win they must grow in Boston and Fll but Wall St has a cow every time. To the point where Jamie Baker said why even grow. What happens if they don’t well someone else will take the flying. It’s like a viscous circle.

What we are seeing imho is JetBlue retrenching and focusing on growing its hubs and doing what it does best. Trans cons and North South/Caribbean. They are now adding much needed frequency and still have more 321 all core planes coming.

JetBlue is not dead far far from it but there is nothing wrong with identifying weak routes or stations and doing away with them.

In the end they are a NY airline (now Bos) flying to places those people want to go. It’s never going to have a massive route map it will most likely never have wide bodies, there is no express carrier to open small city’s with a flight a day there probably won’t be a large west coast operation, it just is what it is.

Agreed 100%. FLL might be their biggest success story recently. Not every step they take will be the right one and they've certainly made their share of mistakes. But given the current operating environment, it seems like they are going to have to fund growth with cuts elsewhere. This quarter, Latin America was weak, so they will probably not do great. But long term, they are adding to where they are good at. We'd all like them to fly more in the west coast or into middle of the country, but it cost a lot of resource to do that. Resources that need to go toward solidifying their biggest 3 focus cities. They have space to grow at BOS and FLL. At JFK, they have cut a bunch of E90 flights and replaced them with destinations like MSY and Carribeans that will be operated by A320/321. I see that ORD is going to all A320s next summer and RDU is even getting 1/2 flights replaced with A320. That's the only way they can add capacity to JFK. They are growing in terms of flight and capacity at JFK this year.

It stinks to cut IAD completely, cut BWI/DTW/PIT-FLL and for JFK-ORD to be down to 2 flights a day, but they need to solidfying their focus cities first. Once that's solidified, then they can make more aggressive moves. All the airlines are going cut back growth signficantly. And there will be a lot of opportunity down the line for B6 as long as their core cities are really profitable.

This is what DL does really well. They completely dominate their fortress hubs. And then when they engage in hugely expensive market share battles at SEA and BOS, none of the wall street guys care, because their overall bottom line is still great. AA doesn't do that well outside of CLT/DFW and now that have to keep cutting to their hubs and still get their stocks smashed. If B6 can get to 35% market share at BOS and 30% market share at FLL, they will be really profitable in those places. If AA gives up some of its JFK slot, B6 should try to get more slots. If JFK slot goes away, that's even better. The terminal expansion at JFK is a great opportunity for them. And if they can get EWR gates with the new terminal opening, they should. Even 2 or 3 more gates would make them quite relevant at EWR. And I think it's great thing they are adding to PBI/BDL/PVD. They should continue to strengthen secondary airports near their primary focus cities. That will only increase their relevance there.

Until they finish with NYC/BOS/South Beach, MCO expansion will be put to hold. Even if they were to get 3 more gates at both LAX and SFO right now, they wouldn't know what to do with them.

I think you are spot on.
I expect things to go down before they come back.
But I’m not overly worried. Meanwhile on airliners.net it will be the end of JetBlue everyday

In fairness, this was an article, and B6 has a ton of support on A.net aside from a few on the fringe. They have a great product and are doing very well in their own right. They are as close to what I would do as an airline as I’ve seen. Too bad they aren’t privately held.

jfklganyc wrote:

tphuang wrote:

Dieuwer wrote:

Is BOS-ORD being cut back??

nope, they are committed to increasing that to 5 a day. in fact, they are keeping JFK-ORD 2 a day even in summer to have enough gate space for BOS-ORD. JFK-ORD will just be upgauged to A320s for the busy months.[/quot

Same old jetblue garbage story. They usually fly four or five daily to JFK in the summer and they are packed. And now because they don’t have the resources at O’Hare they’re down to two daily. Which makes them irrelevant. Just like they are irrelevant in Dallas. Just like they are irrelevant in Washington Dulles. Just like they are irrelevant in Houston. And the five daily to BOS Still makes them barely relevant on that route.

If JetBlue wants to play with the big boys, they have to commit the resources to run an operation. So when Chicago came to them with the second gate offer, they shouldnt have turned it down like they did.

They keep making themselves irrelevant in too many markets. 10 years of doing that and we’re starting to see the chickens come home to roost.

just remember this little tidbit about New York’s Hometown Airline… Starting in January, they can no longer fly you to Washington DC. That really says it all.

This right here is what makes Anet keyboard commandos the bad rep for being capricious in the bubble thinking. RELAX! Where was WN,DL,AA,UA when they where 20 years old? Grant it that market in the US wasn't what it is now, but it took the majors 45+ years to get them the footprint that JetBlue accomplished in just under 20. IF they get aggressive to all those cities your stating they would run out of capital. I'm sure B6 wants all the relevance in the markets you mentioned but you can't wage all round campaign with a halfway matured machine. Their footprint reaches from Alaska to South America, WN being double the age doesn't even have that amount of geography under its wing and B6 flies as many destinations as they do with as well as a much more voluminous international footprint. NK/F9 been around as well twice as long as B6 and B6 already is 2-3 times bigger. They went from being an all egalitarian airline to introducing premium class while schooling the so called "legacy" airlines on how its done and they expanded the initial intent with Mint 3 fold while printing money going up against the big 3 in premium markets and getting ready to expand that over the Atlantic. They have disrupted the industry in many ways. Look at all the IFE on all the airliners these days, thanks to B6 no one wanted to invest in the cabin features at that scale until B6 came along. Same with free fast Wifi, and all Delta does and the others is just catching up all the time to the type of innovation they have brought to the traveling [public. The story is long from over, and right now they are simply getting ready to make the next big play. IN the meantime is about refocusing on their strengths before they do. All the airlines are adjusting markets now. WN just pulled out of DC/EWR-FLL showing B6 is strong in their core markets even against the bigger guys. If you step back it seem like they know what they are doing and doing it quite well.
Everyone is adjusting to rising costs and market conditions, just like they always do and just how B6 has always still prospers, unlike what Anet guys keep saying in some bubble world.

Abeam79 wrote:

jfklganyc wrote:

tphuang wrote:

nope, they are committed to increasing that to 5 a day. in fact, they are keeping JFK-ORD 2 a day even in summer to have enough gate space for BOS-ORD. JFK-ORD will just be upgauged to A320s for the busy months.[/quot

Same old jetblue garbage story. They usually fly four or five daily to JFK in the summer and they are packed. And now because they don’t have the resources at O’Hare they’re down to two daily. Which makes them irrelevant. Just like they are irrelevant in Dallas. Just like they are irrelevant in Washington Dulles. Just like they are irrelevant in Houston. And the five daily to BOS Still makes them barely relevant on that route.

If JetBlue wants to play with the big boys, they have to commit the resources to run an operation. So when Chicago came to them with the second gate offer, they shouldnt have turned it down like they did.

They keep making themselves irrelevant in too many markets. 10 years of doing that and we’re starting to see the chickens come home to roost.

just remember this little tidbit about New York’s Hometown Airline… Starting in January, they can no longer fly you to Washington DC. That really says it all.

Their footprint reaches from Alaska to South America, WN being double the age doesn't even have that amount of geography under its wing and B6 flies as many destinations as they do.

Well, this just has to do with the different strategies that WN and B6 have taken over the years. WN wants to be an airline that just runs 5-6x frequencies a day between large U.S. metro areas and maybe a few transcon flights in the mix, while B6 is willing to expand outside of the U.S. to a much greater degree than WN currently does. Also, having FLL as a major focus point for B6 certainly helps geographically and financially to enter the South American market. However, WN does have a more than large enough fleet to expand into South America if they really wanted to. Their business strategies just significantly differ from one another...

Abeam79 wrote:

jfklganyc wrote:

tphuang wrote:

nope, they are committed to increasing that to 5 a day. in fact, they are keeping JFK-ORD 2 a day even in summer to have enough gate space for BOS-ORD. JFK-ORD will just be upgauged to A320s for the busy months.[/quot

Same old jetblue garbage story. They usually fly four or five daily to JFK in the summer and they are packed. And now because they don’t have the resources at O’Hare they’re down to two daily. Which makes them irrelevant. Just like they are irrelevant in Dallas. Just like they are irrelevant in Washington Dulles. Just like they are irrelevant in Houston. And the five daily to BOS Still makes them barely relevant on that route.

If JetBlue wants to play with the big boys, they have to commit the resources to run an operation. So when Chicago came to them with the second gate offer, they shouldnt have turned it down like they did.

They keep making themselves irrelevant in too many markets. 10 years of doing that and we’re starting to see the chickens come home to roost.

just remember this little tidbit about New York’s Hometown Airline… Starting in January, they can no longer fly you to Washington DC. That really says it all.

This right here is what makes Anet keyboard commandos the bad rep for being capricious in the bubble thinking. RELAX! Where was WN,DL,AA,UA when they where 20 years old? Grant it that market in the US wasn't what it is now, but it took the majors 45+ years to get them the footprint that JetBlue accomplished in just under 20. IF they get aggressive to all those cities your stating they would run out of capital. I'm sure B6 wants all the relevance in the markets you mentioned but you can't wage all round campaign with a halfway matured machine. Their footprint reaches from Alaska to South America, WN being double the age doesn't even have that amount of geography under its wing and B6 flies as many destinations as they do. NK/F9 been around as well twice as long as B6 and B6 already is 2-3 times bigger. They went from being an all egalitarian airline to introducing premium class while schooling the so called "legacy" airlines on how its done and they expanded the initial intent with Mint 3 fold while printing money going up against the big 3 in premium markets and getting ready to expand that over the Atlantic. They have disrupted the industry in many ways. Look at all the IFE on all the airliners these days, thanks to B6 no one wanted to invest in the cabin features at that scale until B6 came along. Same with free fast Wifi, and all Delta does and the others is just catching up all the time to the type of innovation they have brought to the traveling [public. The story is long from over, and right now they are simply getting ready to make the next big play. IN the meantime is about refocusing on their strengths before they do. All the airlines are adjusting markets now. WN just pulled out of DC/EWR-FLL showing B6 is strong in their core markets even against the bigger guys. If you step back it seem like they know what they are doing and doing it quite well.
Everyone is adjusting to rising costs and market conditions, just like they always do and just how B6 has always still prospers, unlike what Anet guys keep saying in some bubble world.

Man that is a great post and part of my love/hate for this site. JetBlue can’t be everything to everyone.
Like you said look at the context of the industry. It’s not the 2000s with a very fragmented airline world. We now have super carriers that pretty much control things. Heck JetBlue couldn’t even get gates next to each other in ATL. Yes that have missed the boat on somethings but it’s like guys looking at an 18 year old kid and saying why aren’t you doing as well as your much older more established brother?

It’s hard to crack areas these days with the consolidation. JetBlue is under heavy competition from all sides with much much stronger majors.

I think that are still amazingly holding their own.

Relax guys. We all have different opinions on what they should do. Nothing wrong with that.

I totally forgot about lgb actually. I would be interested to see what JetBlue bean counters think they could do at lax if they had 5 or 6 gates. Lax has to be on top of their future focus city wish list. I still think they can leverage the growing jetsuitex presence in la basin.

Also, looking at ua q3 earnings, it made me think of a year ago. They were getting shellacked for continuing to grow despite bad numbers. They insisted that they were on the right track. I guess all along they could see they were beating as at sfo, aa at ord, stopping nk expansion at their hubs and chasing wn off their east coast hubs. They saw their basic economy approach was working. As much as I hate their approach, it worked.

For JetBlue, they have been sailing along for 2 or 3 years with steady growth and not really making any really tough decisions. Now that fuel prices are up, they have to institute whole scale network changes, basic economy and increased bag fees.
Fortunately, they started off at pretty healthy margins. It might only take a quarter or two to get back to above average margin. But I hope they don’t dial back their growth plans at the main focus cities after a bad earnings call. That would be the worst outcome.

Abeam79 wrote:

WN just pulled out of DC/EWR-FLL showing B6 is strong in their core markets even against the bigger guys. If you step back it seem like they know what they are doing and doing it quite well.

WN will still be serving FLL nonstop from DCA and BWI after the discontinuation of WN IAD-FLL nonstop service.

JetBlue has the most to lose when the US economy tanks. Their profit margin is heavily, if not all, geared towards MINT. The dedicated MINTers will be the first to pull back in spend come the next downturn. Then what does B6 do, what is their plan for that?

You have a very good post in response to my post and you make a lot of good points.

What I feel you overlook is that most of that stuff was in the past.

Today’s JetBlue:

Worst on time airline Two years into an on-time program

Fuel cost rising... sharklet installation frozen

Cabin refresh...2 planes. The cabins are so old that a new program had To be started to clean them.

Trans atlantic has nothing in place to commence in the short or medium term.

Wi-Fi that used to have a premium option for charge just disappeared. No revenue opportunities there?

The 321LR? 330? 350? No one seems to know… They just talk about it.

The management in place now is stuck in a holding pattern and they don’t seem to know how to get out of the pattern.

Even the route cutting was supposed to be 6 to 8 cities. They couldn’t even do that right. Do you believe cutting Daytona beach and Saint Croix is going to have an appreciable impact on the bottom line?

The cities targeted to be cut were out West one daily. They use tons of gas on red eyes that don’t make money. But they couldn’t cut them; they got cold feet. Because they have nothing else out west.

I’ve been labeled as a JetBlue hater. Couldn’t be further from the truth. I love the airline I love JFK. I am telling you this management team is inept and impotent. they see things that need to be done and they don’t know how to do them.

Is the situation dire? No.

But this is how dire situations begin. They have to turn this around and they have to turn it around now

jplatts wrote:

Abeam79 wrote:

WN just pulled out of DC/EWR-FLL showing B6 is strong in their core markets even against the bigger guys. If you step back it seem like they know what they are doing and doing it quite well.

WN will still be serving FLL nonstop from DCA and BWI after the discontinuation of WN IAD-FLL nonstop service.

Right - the two routes pulled from FLL by WN are routes where UA had dumped extra capacity. WN and B6 chased AA off FLL-DCA and I figured UA would abandon FLL-IAD with WN flying it but the opposite happened. UA went from a single daily to double-daily and a third flight seasonally and WN is done. Similarly as part of the EWR hub restructuring UA added more capacity on EWR-FLL and WN is now pulling from that route. B6 still flies that by the way.