Airlines - where to go now?

[bmibaby.com]

I have been thinking about this a lot lately, considering the fact that we have no-frills airlines all over Europe, Canada, USA now, which markets do you think could support a brand new low-cost airline?

Also, in the United States is there a similar or could there be a similar airport to Ryanair that would be able to fly to strange remote airports and market them as reasonably closeby cities?

What are your opinions?

[Chillwinston]

Think the original Southwest formula has been copied by most low cost airlines across the world. Next generation Lo-co's seem to have taken the low cost idea a step further, low fares, point to point routes but with some frills such as in flight entertainment (live tv - Jetblue, Song etc), presume these services are available at a cost but these lo-co's seem to off pushed the original Southwest model to further heights.

Also believe that the next batch of Lo-co airlines will be in the far east, believe Malaysian Airlines are planning to set up a carrier to compete with new low cost entrants. But the biggest market must surely be mainline china.

[Golf Charlie Charlie]

Isn't there already a successful low-cost operator in Brazil called Gol ?

With regard to Ryanair-style remote airports in the US - there are possibly a few around the New York City area, eg. Newburgh, White Plains, Islip (and maybe other Long Island airfields), the last two of which are already used by Southwest. Also, Hanscom for Boston is a possibility, though there are big noise issues there, maybe Long Beach for Los Angeles and Oakland for San Francisco (both used already by JetBlue), Williamsburg/Newport News for Norfolk or for Richmond (used by AirTran), and there's also some white elephant airport east of St Louis which is used by virtually no-one (I forget its name). Maybe even Northeast Philadalphia and Trenton/Mercer as stand-ins for the busy southeast Pennsylvania/central New Jersey area. Baltimore is already a big Southwest hub (close-ish to Washington).

[bmibaby.com]

The St. Louis MidAmerica airport is only served by PAN AM and some regional airlines and has room to grow!
Is that the airport you are thinking of?

[Golf Charlie Charlie]

bmibaby, yes, I think that's the one.

[bmibaby.com]

Are the taxes and charges in the United States vastly different from the ones in Europe that would ultimately prevent a Ryanair style airline from operating such cheap flights?

Also with JetBlue lets say on the MCO-JFK route, would a New Yorker really want to fly for say a few bucks cheaper and fly to two small airports miles from their city? And would such an operation do better if they had in seat TVs like JetBlue, that Ryanair have actually expressed an interest in installing into their fleet?

[Golf Charlie Charlie]

bmibaby, as for charges to passengers, No, I don't think they are vastly different in the US. Booking with people like Southwest, AirTran or JetBlue you will find the usual taxes/security charges etc. are added on. However, I do have a sense they're a little bit less than in the UK. As far as I know, US airlines don't make a credit card usage charge either, which easyJet does. US low-cost airlines also do not offer the really low fares like those by Ryanair or easyJet, perhaps because distances are somewhat greater on average over there, so the relative impact of additional taxes would seem smaller than on your five quid Ryanair flight when you find you're actually paying 25 !

If you mean handling and landing charges at US airports, short answer is I don't know that one. Some of the smaller airports like those I mentioned in my post above are trying to make themselves attractive to the expanding low-cost carriers, so I assume they make good deals on these fees.

I think the implication behind your second question is right. I doubt Americans are as willing to use out-of-the-way airports as Europeans, but it may just be lack of habituation. Americans usually require good road links to an airport and maybe good car rental outlets, while Europeans may be more long-suffering. Still, I know Southwest's services out of White Plains or Hartford are doing quite well, while JetBlue's services to Long Beach and Oakland are as well. On the other hand, some carriers do well out of mainstream airports too : for example, ATA does a good job on La Guardia to Chicago Midway with attractive fares, versus United or Continental to O'Hare from other New York area airports; or AirTran does well La Guardia or Newark to Atlanta competing against Delta and Continental. So, plainly, with some marketing and setting the right fares structure the formula works.

As for the TVs, these seem popular at JetBlue and a definite marketing edge. JetBlue recently announced a seat pitch increase from 32 to 34 inches as well.