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Over the last few years, approximately 75% of cities in America lost some form of air services, with over 100 cities having lost more than 25%.
Responding to this huge decline in regional flights, with many markets underserved or left behind by United, American or Delta, Breeze Airways Founder and CEO David Neeleman saw an opportunity to reboot the travel industry—for the 5th time.
An airline pioneer, David started multiple commercial airlines including Azul—Brazil’s largest Airline—which transformed the country’s travel and logistics network, WestJet in Canada, Morris Air—which he sold to Southwest, and JetBlue—which broke records as the fastest growing airline.
Breeze now operates more than 150 routes in dozens of cities—and in just two years has already been ranked as one of the country’s best domestic airlines by Travel + Leisure magazine. I invited David to join me for an episode of The Reboot Chronicles podcast to unpack how he is once again rebooting the airline industry—and bringing travel back to underserved communities and beyond.
Is The Fifth Time A Charm?
A five-time serial Airline founder, people are hopeful David can continue with his successful track-record and scale Breeze Airways. Taking a look at that record, Azul coordinates “a thousand flights a day, [and] over a hundred thousand people a day.” Azul also “doubled the air traffic in Brazil,” which made it the largest airline in that region, serving 170 cities, with the next competitor serving 50. Travelers and investors alike are asking—can Breeze repeat that scale and performance?
“a thousands flights a day, [and] over a hundred thousand people a day. We doubled the air traffic in Brazil, becoming the largest airline in Brazil.”
Shifting Services For Shifting Needs
Many airlines currently run on a Hub and Spoke model, in which you have one hub airport that flights are routed through, and the spokes are the destinations from the hub. Breeze is going for the point-to-point route where they do nonstop flights from one destination to another. On top of that, they are adjusting the point-to-point flights that they offer to maximize demands of a given area. As David says “people in Providence love to go to the mid-Atlantic. They love to go to Charleston in the summer, but then [in] winter time, they’d rather go to Vero Beach”.
Although they push for the point-to-point model, they are open to shifting to the hub and spoke if that makes more sense for the business. Breeze wants to maintain the nonstop flights from one area to another, but they are also looking to make a profit off these flights. For example, during peak seasons Breeze may offer flights from Providence nonstop to LAX. Then, when things start to slow down and there is less demand for these flights, Breeze may add a stop in Cincinnati so that they can sell tickets for Cincinnati to Providence and LAX. And to those who would miss those flights if they get moved around make sure to check back with the offered flights in a few months and it could be back.
With Liftoff Complete, What’s The Destination?
Like with all startups, after the initial launch and getting integrated in the market, the next step is to grow. When I asked David what the next five years holds he laid out a fairly simple plan;nbsp; get more planes, and fly to more areas. Now that is a gross simplification of the actual plans, but it holds truth. David told us that they have 120 additional planes on order and he mentioned Breeze is beginning the process to acquire the certifications to allow for International flights and flights to Hawaii. With the intent to keep all those flights as close to the point-to-point model. These upgrades all come under the mantra of “Twice as fast for half the price” that David is keen to uphold as he and Breeze move upwards and onwards.
This is just a fraction of what David had to say about his journey and about where he wants Breeze to go. Listen to the full episode to learn more.
