May 21—Breeze Airways, a new budget airline launched by the founder of JetBlue will fly 10 new direct routes from Louis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport beginning in July, making the city one of the new carrier's four main bases when it commences operations later this month.
The new airline from David Neeleman, who has launched four other airlines over the past four decades, is aiming to tap demand for direct, low-cost travel to smaller and mid-sized U.S. cities that are known for attracting leisure travelers, the company said as part of its announcement Friday.
The first flight from New Orleans will be on July 8 to Charleston, South Carolina, followed by Akron- Canton, Ohio, on July 15. The other new routes are: Bentonville- Fayetteville, Arkansas; Huntsville, Alabama; Louisville, Kentucky; Norfolk, Virginia; Oklahoma City, Oklahoma; Richmond, Virginia; Tulsa, Oklahoma; and Columbus, Ohio.
In all, Breeze Airways will fly 39 direct routes between 16 cities in the south, southwest and eastern parts of the U.S. The other three base cities will be Charleston, Tampa and Norfolk. The airline's first flight will be on May 27 from Charleston and the others will be rolled out through the summer.
The new airline flying out of New Orleans is the latest sign that the city's travel and leisure industry is recovering after the devastation of the coronavirus pandemic. Several other airlines have added service from New Orleans in the last few months, including Silver Airways, which will start offering direct flights to Jacksonsville, Florida, in June. Also, Boutique Air started flying its small aircraft on direct routes to Greenville, Mississippi, in April.
Some of the larger operators from the airport have also added or resumed flights, including American Airlines' new route to Austin and Southwest's and Spirit's new flights to Central American destinations.
Neeleman said the airline has been in the works for several years. It was ready for launch more than a year ago but was postponed because of the pandemic. The company started talking to GNO Inc., the regional economic development agency, back in 2019.
He said he believes the market for leisure travel now looks ready for a robust recovery.
"We've had our foot on the brake and the gas at the same time," he said in an interview, noting that final Department of Transportation certification was granted to the airline Thursday. "As it turned out with the vaccines out there, I think the timing is pretty good."
As with Neeleman's other airline launches — Morris Air, WestJet, JetBlue and Brazilian airline Azul — the concept of Breeze is to provide direct travel routes that don't already exist and to offer budget prices while minimizing the misery factor.
The new flights start at $39 one way and flyers can cancel up to 15 minutes before departure without penalty. The airline will fly a fleet of 13 Brazilian-made Embraer aircraft, 10 Embraer 190s with 108 seats each and three Embraer 195s with 118 seats.
Neeleman said the pandemic has made these airplanes, which are soon to be replaced by a new generation of Embraer models, relatively cheap to acquire. That will help keep down costs and seat prices.
The launch of the new airline with New Orleans as one of its base cities was welcomed by tourism officials and politicians, with Gov. John Bel Edwards saying he expects it will create more than 1,000 new direct and indirect jobs.
Louisiana Economic Development said Breeze will be investing $6.6 million at the airport and will create 261 new direct jobs there, with salaries averaging $65,000. LED estimated an additional 877 new indirect jobs will follow, for a total of more than 1,138 new jobs in the New Orleans area.
The state has agreed to an incentive package with Breeze that includes a performance-based grant of $2.3 million over 10 years, as well as tax breaks on its jobs and training programs.
"I am confident this is just the beginning of what will be a long and fruitful partnership." said Kevin Dolliole, director of aviation at Louis Armstrong International Airport, in a prepared statement. "The New Orleans community is more than ready to take advantage of everything Breeze Airways has to offer."
Neeleman, 61, said later this year Breeze will add Airbus A220-300 aircraft to its fleet, which give it the capacity to travel much longer distances than the Embraer planes do. He said this could open up the opportunity to add routes to international destinations from New Orleans, particularly routes to Central and South America.
Neeleman said that while the airline starts with 39 routes, he sees the potential to add "literally hundreds" of direct routes, most of which don't already exist.
Breeze will have its corporate headquarters in Salt Lake City, Utah, where Neeleman began his career in the early 1980s, selling budget Hawaii holiday packages to his fellow Salt Lakers.
A famously hard-charging executive who was fired by both JetBlue and Southwest Airlines, Neeleman has already courted some controversy with the new airline even before its first official flight. One of the airline's low-cost innovations is to offer students at Utah Valley University scholarships in exchange for training and work as flight attendants.
The move drew criticism from the Association of Flight Attendants, among others, saying the program undervalued their work and role in the passenger safety.
Breeze countered that the students will be trained to the same Federal Aviation Administration standards as other attendants.
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