It shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone that American finally put a dagger in the sorry remains of its old San Juan Caribbean hub. But do you think it was a good idea? Should American have pulled out or was there opportunity for the airline?
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Written by A on January 11, 2013. Reply
I’ve always thought SJU was redundant with the AA hub in Miami. Are there really that many people in the Caribbean traveling amongst the islands? Most people go down there for leisure from up north so what’s the difference from a connection at MIA or DFW vs. SJU? This makes perfect sense to me.
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Written by David SF eastbay on January 11, 2013. Reply
They did it for years using smaller aircraft to fly to just about every where in the caribbean so it made sense. But once so many airlines started flying from major and secondary cities in the U.S. nonstop to a lot of the other islands, then a SJU hub just wasn’t going to cut it anymore.
People still need to fly around the caribbean for business, etc, but SJU is not in a physical location to be a hub for that.
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Written by cubbiefan98 on January 11, 2013. Reply
me! love a SHORT prop trip, i.e. ORD -> SJU -> SXM (40 min. hop)
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Written by DesertGhost on January 11, 2013. Reply
Given jetBlue’s presence in San Juan, it was a matter of when, not if, American was going to pull the plug on its former hub.
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Written by DesertGhost on January 11, 2013. Reply
This is expecially true given the new generation of airline managers who care more about the bottom line than they do about market share.
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Written by Nick Barnard on January 11, 2013. Reply
Which is a great thing… GM in the 90s and 2000s focused on marketshare instead of profits, and that got them nowhere good.
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Written by DesertGhost on January 11, 2013. Reply
I agree. However, it would be nice if I could type the word “especially” (as opposed to expecially).
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Written by EricInChi on January 11, 2013. Reply
SJU made sense in the mid 1980s when MIA was under EAL lockdown. Fast forward 25 years and AA holds the keys to the MIA kingdom and SJU becomes redundant. DesertGhost is right…its about the bottom line, not market share and that is a good thing. The industry has been a Black Hole of capital for two generations and it cant fix problems using the same thinking that got them into that position (sic Einstein).
Poor SJU was a death of a thousand cuts but once the crew base closed the handwriting was on the wall. Here is a really good article from AviationDaily posted last spring:
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Written by Sanjeev M on January 11, 2013. Reply
So if I understand correctly, the AA SJU hub was built up before the MIA hub. In that case it would make sense. At the time I think RDU and BNA were also somewhat important for Southeast connections.
Inter island flying can be a profitable market but at the right cost base. DL could never run Hawaiian’s interisland operation as profitably as HA. In the same way, it seems JetBlue is the carrier that can do it and AA can’t.
Which is fine, so AA can focus on more profitable things like MIA.
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Written by Noah Kimmel on January 11, 2013. Reply
and B6 will do it with bigger a/c less frequency, and likely fewer island destinations. Though given b6 prices, services, baggage, etc. it will be better for many pax. It’s sad to see AA go, but without that feed, the SJU operation wouldn’t remain profitable or worthwhile, and redundant hubs dont lead to more profit.
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Written by Gabe Andino on January 11, 2013. Reply
The AA hub operation at both MIA and SJU popped up around the same time in the late-’80s as they picked up both from Eastern. Eastern was the dominant carrier in SJU for a couple of decades and once they went under AA picked up what was left. Now B6 will likely build up SJU although likely not to the same scope that AA did. It’s like the circle of airline life. :-)
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Written by Seth on January 11, 2013. Reply
Given that JetBlue already flies many of those routes, it isn’t that surprising. This seems like a good chance for a small airline to come in and scoop up those routes. Trying doing what Redjet couldn’t, hopefully this time with smaller more efficient planes.
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Written by Trent880 on January 11, 2013. Reply
There’s no business in SJU any more, so the lowest cost provider is going to win the traffic and right now that is B6. Expect further AA trunk routes to be reduced (ORD/DFW/MIA/JFK) now that some of these high yield beyond SJU markets are being canned. It’s an interesting philosophical discussion as to whether SJU is better off–they’ve lost plenty of network connectivity, destinations, and perhaps higher yield customers, but replaced it with high volume, low fare traffic. Are they better off?
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Written by Noah Kimmel on January 11, 2013. Reply
I’ll be curious to see if/when b6 offers SJU-PHL/ORD/AUS
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Written by MeanMeosh on January 11, 2013. Reply
And let’s not forget WN. I’m sure DAL/HOU/MDW-SJU direct is coming soon enough.
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Written by Chicago Chris on January 11, 2013. Reply
What’s also interesting is United recently announced it is no longer serving ORD-SJU. The door is wide open for WN to grab Chicago market share or Spirit.
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Written by Gabe Andino on January 11, 2013. Reply
AA cut ORD-SJU a few years ago. I’d imagine the other remaining routes from the hubs will remain.
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Written by Gabe Andino on January 14, 2013. Reply
That should have they cut frequencies on ORD-SJU. It used to be 3x a day and now it’s just once daily.
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Written by Ed Kelty on January 11, 2013. Reply
The heyday of San Juan travel was –could it be 50 years ago — when Eastern flew people to New York City for $49 one way. This led to an influx of Puerto Ricans who repopulated the Bronx. Eastern is gone and there no longer is that demand. So, it makes sense for the financially troubled AA to drop the hub.
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Written by AvGeek on January 11, 2013. Reply
The Puerto Rican diaspora in NYC has much more to do with economic conditions on the island than with cheap fares on Eastern. In fact, many of the islanders who relocated in the 50s and 60s came by boat. Can we please stick to aviation on this site and not socio-demographic speculation?
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Written by Kevin on January 11, 2013. Reply
I sense that there isn’t much love lost on either side. For many years, many of the Caribbean islands complained bitterly about AA’s “stranglehold” on traffic there, even though AA and Eagle were providing good service and connectivity. Revenue guarantees to other carriers for non SJU (US Airways., etc) started the decline of AA’s dominance there & lessened the need for some of the connections. B6′s massively successful foray helped to finish AA off. NK, DL, and FL helped too. So, AA walks away from money-Losing /limited long-term potential routes and the Caribbean islands that complained about AA for so long will no longer have them to complain about. Maybe Cape Air and LIAT can pick up or expand on the former Eagle routes.
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Written by Kevin on January 12, 2013. Reply
I agree. SJU isn’t better off in terms of premium cabin access or connectivity, but Cranky’s question was “should American have pulled out or was there opportunity for the airline?” I think AA exploited the opportunity while it was there, and probably stayed longer than it should, and now it’s time to move on. I sensed the end was near when it didn’t take hardly any time for AA to announce it was exiting BDL-SJU once B6 announced they were starting it. AA could probably see what’s happened to all of the routes once B6 started.
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Written by Don on January 13, 2013. Reply
I agree WN will do good in SJU. But I also keep in mind that these are the converted Airtran routes. They are going head to head with b6. Although they will steal some of their customers it will still be an uphill battle. I also believe that AA just gave up on SJU because they wanted to exit bankruptcy by themselves and merge with b6 (gaining back what they gave up) and make a good profit doing so. Now that US Airways is sounding the merger horn with them; that’s messing up their post bankruptcy plans. My prediction is that AA and US merge focusing a little bit on the SJU and surrounding markets going after bigger fish. WN expands more into SJU and surrounding markets (basically doing what b6 is currently doing). And b6 expands even bigger into SJU and surrounding markets co-existing with WN. If AA and US don’t merge; I predict a hostile take over of b6 post AA bankruptcy. And that would spell trouble for WN if that happens.
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Written by Stephen on January 13, 2013. Reply
I am sure that we will be adding for connections to SJU this year and over the next few years. I would not be surprised if SJU becomes a jumping point to a few South American destinations either. The E-190 seems to be doing well for us there also.
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Written by Juan Garcia on January 13, 2013. Reply
There’s more to the SJU AA hub that would be common knowledge. The main reason AA is walking out on SJU is their constant disagreements with the local government. AA felt they could dictate the rules on SJU operations. They felt their stronghold would make the local government buckle under pressure. Well, they were wrong. Other airlines are serving SJU better than AA ever did at lower fares. The other aspect is the fact that they put a MIA manager to oversee SJU and he made every effort to move most SJU passengers through their MIA hub. Thus slowly destroying SJU as a heavily AA traveled location. AA is missing the point on SJU. SJU is a lot more than a connecting point to the islands. There are a lot of business travelers, politicians, cruise ship passengers and local/stateside residents that visit relatives and vacation in SJU. These passengers don’t connect to the islands.
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Written by Juan Garcia on January 13, 2013. Reply
Must continue>>>>>> Jet Blue is doing quite well with non-stops to BOS-DCA-Dominican Republic, several Florida locations and the US Virgin Islands. Routes that were all AA but they couldn’t or wouldn’t compete on. Other airlines are doing quite well in SJU as they grow their daily flights in and out of SJU.
It’s sad that AA can’t serve SJU better since they could do well financially in spite of their bad attitude flight crews on board. -
Written by Ken on January 13, 2013. Reply
Seabourne Airlines is picking up the slack for Beef Island, St Thomas and St Croix. They recently purchased 3 Saab 340′s. http://www.seaborneairlines.com. Just flew out of SJU this evening and the AA terminal is really a ghost town. The ATR 72′s are looking pretty tired as AA is going to return them. Gate agent was pretty rude too, probably knowing she is unemployed in a few months. My hotel in SJU overlooked the airport and watched the planes come and go and Jet Blue has certainly taken over there.
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