August 4, 2022

Allegiant Squeaks Out Q2 Profit

Allegiant and its parent company Allegiant Travel Group earned a Q2 profit of $4.4 million on nearly $630 million in revenue despite soaring costs.

The $630 million in revenue represented a 28% increase from Q2 2019, with TRASM up 15% in the same period. Allegiant benefited during the quarter from being the rare ULCC not embroiled in a never-ending game of chicken with Spirit. June was the highest-revenue month in the company’s history in terms of both gross dollars and on a per flight basis.

Allegiant’s average fare was $131.69, a nice 15% increase from 2019, with ancillary fees up to $60.19, a 16.5% bump. It expanded its network by 10 cities during Q2, and a couple of those additions are places people actually want to go.

It ended he quarter with $1.2 billion in cash and investments, including 65,000 new cupholders for Allegiant Stadium and a bunch of LUV travel vouchers that expired the day before Southwest eliminated credit expiration.

Avelo Heads to the Desert

Avelo Airlines newest city will be Palm Springs where the carrier will begin seasonal service to three destinations this November.

Palm Springs will be Avelo’s 30th destination, serving Sonoma County from the airport plus two cities in Oregon: Eugene and Bend/Redmond. Each city will fly twice-weekly to Palm Springs on 189-seat B737-800 aircraft.

Flights begin November 11 and will run through April, or when county officials finally get Coachella cleaned, whichever comes first. Avelo won’t have any competition on the route except common sense and the potential death due to old age of customers heading to the Coachella Valley.

JAL Tells 3,000 Employees to Zip it

Japan Airlines is moving about 3,000 mainline employees away from the flagship brand and instead to its LCC subsidiary ZIPAIR and other non-aviation roles.

JAL is struggling as business travel has significantly lagged in Japan, but domestic leisure travel is back at nearly 90% of its level prior to the pandemic. By moving the staff to the budget ZIPAIR, it can more properly align its operation with where the demand currently exists.

At its last reporting in 2021, JAL had just over 35,000 employees, meaning it will still employ plenty of staff for its current demand levels after this transfer. The carrier expects demand for its international flights to remain below 50% of pre-pandemic levels until at least the middle of next year.

  • Air Zimbabwe scraped together $1.4 million to pay back what it owed to IATA.
  • American is beginning work on a ski lodge new Admirals Club at Washington/National.
  • Atlas Air was sold.
  • Canada Jetlines delayed its launch by two weeks to August 29.
  • Cathay Pacific turns 40 today. And if Hong Kong keeps up its tight COVID-19 policies, it could be another 40 years until it turns a profit.
  • Copa reported a $13.2 million profit for Q2.
  • Frontier CEO Barry Biffle is drowning his post-Spirit blues at a concert in Phoenix later this month and for some reason wants some random person to join him.
  • Hans Airways took delivery of its first A330-200.
  • IndiGo plans to begin deplaning its A320s with three doors.
  • Jazeera Airways is adding new 4x weekly flights to Buraydah (ELQ).
  • JetBlue‘s first flight from Boston to London flew today. Passengers with previously booked seats on the flight to London/Gatwick were subject to being bumped unless they paid a $29 inaugural flight fee, a concept borrowed from future merger partner Spirit.
  • Northern Pacific is considering going south. Who knows what’s next…perhaps the Northern Atlantic?
  • Viva Aerobus is beginning a codeshare with Iberia on connections beyond Mexico City beginning August 30.

I was playing in a poker game last night but accidentally spilled my cottage cheese everywhere.

I guess you could say I laid all my curds out on the table.