Bigger than the MIA announcement: AA + WestJet

[eolesen]

http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/american-airlines-and-westjet-announce-commercial-agreement-105294938.html

"This agreement represents WestJet's first interline with a U.S. carrier and we are excited to be working with such a well established and recognized global airline like American Airlines," said Hugh Dunleavy, WestJet's Executive Vice-President, Strategy and Planning. "We look forward to welcoming the many American customers on board our aircraft as guests who will experience WestJet's world-class guest experience."


Just like Jetblue, this is just an interline agreement, not a codeshare.

Ironic, in that Westjet was supposed to link up with Southwest, then they said it would be Delta.

Yet here they are announcing an interline agreement with AA?

Maybe there really is something to be said for not being the biggest airline... AA's gotten pretty much everything they've asked for from the DOT, and now has interline agreements with two of the largest non-Alliance-aligned LCC's. Granted, they're not exclusive agreements, and all three carriers use Sabre, but every little bit helps...

 

[737823]

http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/american-airlines-and-westjet-announce-commercial-agreement-105294938.html

"This agreement represents WestJet's first interline with a U.S. carrier and we are excited to be working with such a well established and recognized global airline like American Airlines," said Hugh Dunleavy, WestJet's Executive Vice-President, Strategy and Planning. "We look forward to welcoming the many American customers on board our aircraft as guests who will experience WestJet's world-class guest experience."


Just like Jetblue, this is just an interline agreement, not a codeshare.

Ironic, in that Westjet was supposed to link up with Southwest, then they said it would be Delta.

Yet here they are announcing an interline agreement with AA?

Maybe there really is something to be said for not being the biggest airline... AA's gotten pretty much everything they've asked for from the DOT, and now has interline agreements with two of the largest non-Alliance-aligned LCC's. Granted, they're not exclusive agreements, and all three carriers use Sabre, but every little bit helps...

Will this decimate AA's Canada operations much like the JetBlue agreement has for AA's once expansive Northeast and Boston network? Never flow WestJet but it seems they have new Boeing planes, LiveTV and friendly service-what's not to like?

Josh

 

[FrugalFlyerv2.0]

Will this decimate AA's Canada operations much like the JetBlue agreement has for AA's once expansive Northeast and Boston network? Never flow WestJet but it seems they have new Boeing planes, LiveTV and friendly service-what's not to like?

Josh

I believe David Neeleman was involved in helping Westjet get off the ground. Initially they wisely chose to set up shop in western Canada where at that time CP was too weak (financially) to crush them and AC did not seem to care. Speaking of CP, this arrangement with Westjet may compliment AA's operations much like CP did back in the 1990's. It could also be the begining of Westjet joining 1-world, I believe they codeshare with CX, but on the other hand they also have an interline relationship with AF/KL.

 

[eolesen]

Will this decimate AA's Canada operations much like the JetBlue agreement has for AA's once expansive Northeast and Boston network?

Got any facts or stats to back that up, Josh?... What has AA shrunk as a result of the Jetblue interline agreement? SJU? Please. That's been an ever-shrinking operation for over ten years, and almost all of the "shrink" was offset by growth at MIA, often to the same destinations served via SJU...

 

[jersey777]

Got any facts or stats to back that up, Josh?... What has AA shrunk as a result of the Jetblue interline agreement? SJU? Please. That's been an ever-shrinking operation for over ten years, and almost all of the "shrink" was offset by growth at MIA, often to the same destinations served via SJU...

Oh come on are you kidding? I am surprised at you. What about Boston and the retreat there after the arrival of Jetblue? I'm not saying that the new agreement with Westjet is a bad thing but domestically we are allowing Jetblue to feed our international routes in New York. We will see what happens with Canadian flying.

 

[eolesen]

Oh come on are you kidding? I am surprised at you. What about Boston and the retreat there after the arrival of Jetblue? I'm not saying that the new agreement with Westjet is a bad thing but domestically we are allowing Jetblue to feed our international routes in New York. We will see what happens with Canadian flying.

I said "after the signing of the interline agreement" -- what routes has AA pulled out of since then?

Even with the loss of SJU, it still looks like they have 40 flights a day there between AA and Eagle: 5x to LAX, 3x to SFO, 7x to DFW and ORD, 3x to MIA, and Eagle with 5x to DCA, LGA, and JFK.

Go find a timetable before Jetblue started up in 2000, and the only things I see missing are SJU, RDU, and maybe MCO or FLL on a seasonal basis.

Back to the topic... What exactly do you expect to see disappear for Canadian flying? The only route AA and WS overlap on is MIA-YYZ, and I doubt that's going anywhere soon. If anything it looks like this will just be taking some customers away from the AS/QX codeshare.

 

[jersey777]

I said "after the signing of the interline agreement" -- what routes has AA pulled out of since then?

Even with the loss of SJU, it still looks like they have 40 flights a day there between AA and Eagle: 5x to LAX, 3x to SFO, 7x to DFW and ORD, 3x to MIA, and Eagle with 5x to DCA, LGA, and JFK.

Go find a timetable before Jetblue started up in 2000, and the only things I see missing are SJU, RDU, and maybe MCO or FLL on a seasonal basis.

Back to the topic... What exactly do you expect to see disappear for Canadian flying? The only route AA and WS overlap on is MIA-YYZ, and I doubt that's going anywhere soon. If anything it looks like this will just be taking some customers away from the AS/QX codeshare.

I am not sure as to what to expect but my hope is that we would possibly reinstate JFK-YVR and MIA-YVR.

 

[737823]

Got any facts or stats to back that up, Josh?... What has AA shrunk as a result of the Jetblue interline agreement? SJU? Please. That's been an ever-shrinking operation for over ten years, and almost all of the "shrink" was offset by growth at MIA, often to the same destinations served via SJU...

Eliminated or scheduled to end since JetBlue announcement (routes JB either concurrently or will operate in future)
-SFO
-DCA
-SJU
-RDU
-SAN (This one was supposed to come back for the summer per the Admiral's club staff but corporate changed their mind once JetBlue added an additional flight)

When I first started flying AA in BOS in 2002, they were #1. They had just started LHR on on new (at the time) 777s, significant widebody Airbus A300 and 777 to MIA, 3-class to LAX, 767 to SFO, and more. Now AA is a small player in the BOS market and has been eclipsed by JB and DL. AA's presence here is largely insignificant if you consider only two destination (DFW and MIA) and one marketplace (Dallas/Ft. Worth) is exclusively served by AA.

The drawdown isn't all that bad because starting in November I can justify flying Virgin America to SFO and expense a cash upgrade. The opportunity to fly BA to Heathrow is great too, thanks to the new partnership.

Josh