Jetblue Adds Sacramento, Ca To Route Map!

[BlueFlyer21]

JETBLUE TO ADD DAILY NONSTOP SERVICE BETWEEN

NEW YORK CITY AND SACRAMENTO, CA STARTING MARCH 3



-- Low-fare Carrier to Launch Daily Flight to New York from

California’s Capital with Introductory Sale Fare Starting at $99* Each Way --





New York, NY (January 6, 2004) – JetBlue Airways [NASDAQ: JBLU], New York City’s low-fare carrier, today announced plans to launch daily nonstop redeye service between John F. Kennedy International Airport and Sacramento, CA, starting March 3, the first and only nonstop service between the two cities. Sacramento will be JetBlue’s fifth California city served, joining LA/Long Beach, Oakland, San Diego and Ontario.



JetBlue is offering introductory sale fares between New York and Sacramento starting at $99* each way if booked at www.jetblue.com. Sale fares require a 7-day advance purchase and must be purchased by January 31, 2004 for travel through May 24, 2004. Seats are limited and customers are encouraged to book early to obtain sale fares. The airline’s regular fares on the route will range from $139* to $299* each way if booked at the airline’s website, www.jetblue.com.

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"I applaud JetBlue for expanding their California presence to include Sacramento,†said California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger. “Their decision to connect the Capitol City and New York City offers greater opportunities for commerce and tourism in this vibrant part of our state. JetBlue's expansion is the latest sign that California is open for business, and that our state's economy is taking flight."



“Sacramento will soon be home to both the ‘Terminator’ and JetBlue, the ‘low-fare liberator,’†said David Neeleman, CEO of JetBlue Airways. “JetBlue will bring travelers in California’s capital not only low fares but a unique flying experience with new planes with 34-inch seat pitch for most seats, free inflight satellite TV, and award-winning friendly service.â€



"East Coast service has been our number one priority for a long time and we are very excited about having the inauguration of JFK service by such a well respected airline as JetBlue,†said Muriel Johnson, Chair, Sacramento County Board of Supervisors. “Their high quality customer service is well known in the airline business and Sacramento County residents will soon be able to experience it for themselves firsthand."





New York City (JFK) to Sacramento (SMF) Sacramento to New York City

Depart Arrive Depart Arrive

7:35pm 10:55pm 11:55pm 7:55am (next day)





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JetBlue is a low-fare, low-cost passenger airline, which provides high-quality customer service. JetBlue operates a fleet of 53 new Airbus A320 aircraft and plans to add another 16 A320s to its fleet in 2004. The airline has on order 100 EMBRAER 190 aircraft with options for an additional 100 with deliveries scheduled to begin in mid 2005. All JetBlue aircraft feature roomy all-leather seats each equipped with free live satellite television, offering up to 24 channels of DIRECTV® Programming at every seat.** JetBlue has been named “Best Domestic Airline†for the last two years by the readers of Conde Nast Traveler magazine.

Based out of New York City's John F. Kennedy International Airport, JetBlue currently operates 214 flights a day and serves 21 destinations in 10 states and Puerto Rico and commences service tomorrow from Boston to Denver, CO, Orlando and Tampa, FL and on January 16, to Fort Lauderdale, FL and LA/Long Beach, CA. With JetBlue, all seats are assigned, all travel is ticketless, all fares are one-way, and a Saturday night stay is never required. For more information, schedules and fares, please visit www.jetblue.com or call JetBlue reservations at 1-800-JETBLUE (538-2583). This press release, as well as past press releases, can be found on www.jetblue.com.

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* Fares reflect $5 discount only when booked at www.jetblue.com. Fares are as booked on www.jetblue.com and do not include Passenger Facility Charges of up to $9 each way and a Federal Segment Tax of $3.10 per segment.

** DIRECTV® service is not available on flights between New York City and San Juan, Puerto Rico.

 

[funguy2]

I imagine this is a political move aimed at persuading Arnold the Gov'ner to help 'strong-arm' the local authorities at LGB to make more slots available. Its not like jetBlue has never played politics before...

 

[Daedalus]

If it is a politcally driven move by the management at jetBlue then more power to them.

At least they understand that sometimes good business means demonstrating adroit political skills and seizing upon political opportunities. You'd think some of the more experienced airlines in this business could have helped themselves much more by developing similar skills

 

[MiAAmi]

Don't you think that flying Bush around on a AA retro painted 737 would fall under this catagory?

 

[bigbusdrvr]

UH OH!!!

Just heard B6 is pullin out of LGB-LAS.... Can anybody spin this or is this another cut an run..ala ATL-LGB???? Lets hear it!! I see stock shortin on my horizon!! Can B6 employees short their own stock?? Could be some millionaires to be!!!

 

[AKAAB]

Sure - short the stock. Options were designed to take money from people that had no insight into market dynamics.

JetBlue will probably allocate the LGB slots used for LAS flights to higher yield flights from BOS, JFK, FLL and ANC. (Just kidding about Anchorage!) LAS service was not started with the intent to make a ton of money in the short term, rather, was started to activate and use the slots allocated to JetBlue at LGB before AA could argue the slots were being hoarded and not used. JetBlue gave up a couple of slots to avoid an expensive drawn-out legal battle. The remaining slots have slowly been reallocated to more profitable city-pairs.

Now, the funny thing is, I think JB was making a small profit on LGB-LAS. However, as you do your research before you start shorting the stock, I'm sure you will realize the long-term value of protecting the LGB slots over the low LGB-LAS yields.

AKAAB

 

[bigbusdrvr]

Sure - short the stock. Options were designed to take money from people that had no insight into market dynamics.

JetBlue will probably allocate the LGB slots used for LAS flights to higher yield flights from BOS, JFK, FLL and ANC. (Just kidding about Anchorage!) LAS service was not started with the intent to make a ton of money in the short term, rather, was started to activate and use the slots allocated to JetBlue at LGB before AA could argue the slots were being hoarded and not used. JetBlue gave up a couple of slots to avoid an expensive drawn-out legal battle. The remaining slots have slowly been reallocated to more profitable city-pairs.

Now, the funny thing is, I think JB was making a small profit on LGB-LAS. However, as you do your research before you start shorting the stock, I'm sure you will realize the long-term value of protecting the LGB slots over the low LGB-LAS yields.

AKAAB

Interesting insight!! But no, I will just short the stock based on historical actions of upstart carriers such as Peoples express. They make a great return for those that can get out after the reality sets in!! Not like we havent seen this senerio before?? What were you people thinking??? Are you the new chosen ones?? Get a grip and get out now if you can, ridin a turd into the ground was already done in a movie!!

 

[ClueByFour]

UH OH!!!

Just heard B6 is pullin out of LGB-LAS.... Can anybody spin this or is this another cut an run..ala ATL-LGB???? Lets hear it!! I see stock shortin on my horizon!! Can B6 employees short their own stock?? Could be some millionaires to be!!!

Ever occur to you and your expert broker that they only did the LGB-LAS turn to keep the slots from AA and the rest of the then vultures at LGB?

Now they can allocate them to markets with much greater profit margin.

 

[bigbusdrvr]

UH OH!!!

Just heard B6 is pullin out of LGB-LAS.... Can anybody spin this or is this another cut an run..ala ATL-LGB???? Lets hear it!! I see stock shortin on my horizon!! Can B6 employees short their own stock?? Could be some millionaires to be!!!

Ever occur to you and your expert broker that they only did the LGB-LAS turn to keep the slots from AA and the rest of the then vultures at LGB?

Now they can allocate them to markets with much greater profit margin.

Bye all means stay long the stock!! It is a free market!! Good luck!!

 

[iflyjetz]

BigBusDriver, as mentioned by others, the LGB-LAS flights were to hold JBLU's LGB slots. JBLU did not have enough available airframes to support the amount of transcons that JBLU wanted to fly out of LGB, so they used those slots to fly LGB-LAS. The plan makes sense; hold the slots until you have enough airframes to fly additional transcons.

As for shorting JBLU, it is probably a very good call for a number of reasons.

First and foremost, both DAL and AMR are aggressively going after JBLU. They don't need to take a large amount of JBLU's traffic; just enough to cut into their load factors to put JBLU into the red. (It doesn't take much).

Second, JBLU is starting to see increasing expenses for infrastructure. That infrastructure that won't produce any revenue, but will be necessary as the company grows. Here are a couple of projects:

http://www.findarticles.com/cf_dls/m0EIN/2...1/article.jhtml

http://www.jetblue.com/learnmore/pressDeta....asp?newsId=194

Third, JBLU employees have an ESOP (I think they call it something different) where employees can buy JBLU stock for 5% below open market value. As JBLU stock remains flat/drifts lower, more and more employees will 'flip' that stock to take the quick profit.
JBLU's ESOP inflates JBLU's cash position. But it's also like JBLU is continually doing secondary stock offerings (all the while diluting shareholder value). That ponzi scheme works great when the stock is going up, but how's it going to fare as the walls come tumbling down? I hope that JBLU employees don't hold onto too much of their stock; they will find out (as so many employees of airlines past have found out) that buying one's airline stock makes for expensive wallpaper.

My longterm prognosis is that JBLU will go the way of Legacy and People Express.

 

[funguy2]

My point in making the political comment, is that I feel there are probably better market opportunities for JetBlue out there... like PHX, PDX, SJC for example, but SMF may have beat out those other opportunities just because of playing politics... Never said playing politics was bad business

 

[PLANES333]

The reason why B6 chose SMF is becuase many of the customers using OAK airport had a final destination on areas surrounds SMF. It only made sence for them to fly to SMF, since they already established a customer base. B6 did the same thing in SAN, when they saw how many customers would end up driving from LGB to SAN, they started flights to SAN. I know that in the near future we will also so BQN (aguadillia P.R.) come on line. The SJU market is a huge money maker for B6, since so many customers in NY do not like or can not afford AA. B6 also noticed that many customers who fly to SJU drive to BQN and BQN is underserved and considered higher yeilding than SJU.

The SMF flight will be a red-eye. In other words, the plane would have just sat in JFK overnight, but instead we will use it to fly to SMF and back to JFK intime for some AM departures. This strategy has been very lucrative for B6, since it not only establishes the airline in the market, but it also gets extra revenue out of an aircraft that would otherwise be siting idle.

As for PHX and SJC? I was told in one of our monthly pocket sessions with David Neelman and Dave Barger, that we will be looking at cities in the caribbean (BQN) Northern Cali (SMF), New Enlgland (BOS), Arizona (PHX????), Texas (DFW????IAH???) and the carolinas (RD???). This session was in Aug, and in that short amount of time BOS and SMF were announce. Next will be BQN and then we will see about the other cities.

 

[downline7]

Tomorrow starts SMF service!

Good luck B6 ...

Airwise.com:

"The airline said advance bookings for its new non-stop service between Sacramento and New York are well in excess of expectations"

KXTV10.com:

"Low-Cost Airline Offers Nonstop Flight to New York from Sacramento

Sacramento International Airport gets its first nonstop flight to the East Coast when JetBlue Airways premieres its overnight service between Sacramento to New York on Wednesday.

The daily red-eye will depart from Sacramento at 11:55 p.m. and arrive at New York's JFK International Airport at 7:55 a.m. The westbound flight leaves New York City at 7:35 p.m. and arrives in Sacramento at 10:55 p.m.

Sacramento airport officials have wanted to attract an air carrier to provide a nonstop flight option since United Airlines cancelled its Sacramento-to-Washington, D.C. service in October 2001. Airport operators believe a daily, nonstop coast-to-coast connection could encourage companies considerating locating in the Capitol region. It also saves time for travelers who have had to either drive to the Bay Area for nonstop flights or take flights with stopovers.

JetBlue promotes itself as the low-fare carrier with wider-than-average leather seats and satellite TV. It flies A320 Airbuses. The new route fares range from $139 to $299.

Sacramento is the fifth city in California serviced by JetBlue. The others are Oakland, Ontario, Long Beach and San Diego."

 

[k2air]

:blink: Look at jetBlue's route map (most exclusively east coast, west coast and florida). They need to start looking to the hinterland for their next cities. Chicago, MSP. They shouldn't wait for the influx of Embraers to serve these markets.