This is the last post I’m writing on Spirit’s demise directly, but you know you want more. So, head to The Air Show and listen to this week’s episode where we talk about the government’s role in Spirit’s demise. No, this isn’t political. It spans multiple administrations led by both sides of the aisle. Just listen for yourself.
One of the big benefits to the airline industry of Spirit having failed is the reduction in capacity. Sure, it’s not a huge amount — in April according to Cirium, Spirit had 3.1 percent of total domestic capacity and 2.2 percent of all capacity departing the US — but every bit helps when you are trying to raise fares in the face of the high jet fuel prices caused by the war in Iran. Still, as we discussed on Tuesday regarding Fort Lauderdale, that doesn’t mean there aren’t opportunities for airlines to backfill to further their strategies. Today, I want to talk about some of those other opportunities.
Detroit
Listeners to The Air Show know that I love this market as an opportunity for Sun Country and have for a long time. The similiarities between DTW and MSP are clear. According to Cirium, in the first three months of the year, Delta had 71.4 percent of all seats departing Detroit and 72.0 percent of all seats departing Minneapolis/St Paul to the western hemisphere. Number two in Detroit was Spirit with 9.9 percent, and number two in MSP was Sun Country at 11.7 percent.
Frontier has already made some growth moves in Detroit, and it said on its earnings call this week that Detroit was one of the five markets in which it had a particular interest. But in Q1 to the western hemisphere, Frontier had only built to 3.9 percent of departing seats from there and only 1.5 percent in MSP. There is still opportunity there and Sun Country should take it.
Of course, Sun Country is now just about officially a part of Allegiant, so this requires Allegiant to decide it’s worth doing. It also has to hope that this move doesn’t anger Delta so much that it rains fire in both hubs. But Delta has to know that there will be a low-fare carrier in both markets. If it can get one that it knows the playbook versus a wildcard like Frontier, it might just feel more comfortable.
The bigger question is whether Allegiant will be willing to make this move. If it doesn’t, then Frontier is probably next in line.
New York LaGuardia
The situation in New York is more challenging mostly because it’s not entirely clear to me when the ownership of slots technically ends, when they can be reallocated, and how the process will go down. At LaGuardia in summer 2025, Spirit held 12 departure slots and 10 arrival slots per day. If you assume that the last two arrivals happen late enough to not need slots, you’re effectively looking at 12 slot pairs. Spirit was also leasing a couple other slots, I assume, since it had more flights than slots. Further, Spirit was the one airline flying out of the Marine Air Terminal (now Terminal A) at LaGuardia, so there’s a whole turnkey operation ready to go. Who might be interested?
I have to think Frontier is going to raise its hand. It only holds four daily slot pairs, but it leases others and flies about twice as many. You could imagine Frontier being an easy sell to regulators since it’s a small carrier with low fares. If the goal is to improve competition at a jam-packed airport, then you can’t give it to Delta and American. Southwest will probably take a swing as well, because, why not? Sure, JetBlue is an option, but I don’t see why JetBlue would bother putting capacity there when Fort Lauderdale is the most important project by far. Breeze? Allegiant? I mean, never say never.
Newark
Across the rivers at Newark, it is a different story. Of course, that airport has runway timings, so it’s a different process than slots. But Spirit had eight percent of departing seats to the western hemisphere and was number two at the airport, so there is opportunity. Again, I would think Frontier might have the inside track, but both Allegiant+Sun Country and Breeze are in this airport already, so perhaps they would like to grow. Again, I think JetBlue is unlikely. It doesn’t have spare capacity, but also, it has its Blue Sky partnership with United which allows TrueBlue customers to earn when flying out of Newark anyway.
Orlando
I expect the Orlando market to be hotly-contested, and really, it already has been. Southwest took no time in announcing new service from Orlando in the wake of Spirit’s failure. Southwest already had nearly a quarter of all MCO departures followed by Delta at 12 percent, Frontier at 11 percent, and Spirit just over 10 percent. Southwest wants to grow its share, and it isn’t waiting around.
Who else might be interested? A lot of airlines, no doubt. Orlando is one of Frontier’s largest cities, and you have to assume that this will be a priority for the airline. Breeze is going to want to grow here as well, and don’t even count out Delta which might increase capacity as a defensive stance.
If there’s one airline I don’t expect to participate it’s JetBlue. JetBlue is a big player here at 9.2 percent, so you’d think it might care. But Orlando’s importance is nothing compared to Fort Lauderdale’s. If JetBlue has extra aircraft, I would assume they will be diverted to Fort Lauderdale and not wasted here.
Las Vegas
Vegas is a funny market. Spirit used to matter, but by the end, it barely did. In Q1, Southwest had 43 percent of departing seats with Frontier at 8.2 percent and Spirit down at 3.5 percent. Just as it did in Orlando, Southwest quickly announced it would add flights in Vegas. Frontier will probably do that as well, but it’s already the dominant ULCC there and likely doesn’t have a lot to gain. My guess is it wants to focus growth more elsewhere while Southwest continues to consolidate its power.
Atlantic City
For years, Spirit was the only airline in Atlantic City. This was one of the airline’s largest operations back in the day, and it always performed well. But as Spirit’s future became murkier, both Allegiant and Breeze moved into the market. Once Spirit failed, Breeze jumped in quickly and added Fort Myers, Myrtle Beach, Orlando, and West Palm Beach service. Now, every market Spirit served from ACY has flights from Allegiant or Breeze except for Miami, and that’s not an airport that necessarily needs backfilling.
Admittedly, Atlantic City wasn’t one of the markets even on my radar in all of this shuffling, but once I saw Breeze make its move, it instantly became one of my favorite backfill efforts. This is a perfect market for Breeze, and it should do well.
Myrtle Beach
This market is a lot like Atlantic City, a secondary leisure destination with some local demand. American is the biggest airline in this market, but Spirit had nearly 20 percent of seats so there is a big hole there. Breeze already has more than 13 percent of seats, so I imagine we will continue to see it grow even beyond the Atlantic City flight it just added. Allegiant also has about five percent of seats, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see more there as well. This one probably isn’t a Frontier market.
Dallas/Fort Worth
I don’t think I’d even bother writing up DFW if not for Frontier’s earnings call where it named DFW as one of the five airports where it was focusing its Spirit-backfill efforts. Frontier had already surpassed Spirit in the area with Q1 seeing Frontier at 4 percent of departing seats while Spirit was at 2.3 percent. But Frontier has wanted to grow there, and all of a sudden, there are gates available right next door to its own. So it’ll grow modestly there, and it will probably look to do something similar at Atlanta, Chicago/O’Hare, and Houston/IAH. I don’t expect this to be a huge focus, but if there’s an opportunity to grow a little, Frontier will probably do it.
In the end, I hope that airlines will not completely backfill Spirit’s capacity. That’s not what the industry needs right now. But there are certainly holes that can be filled, and each airline has probably set its priorities long ago. We’ll now see that strategy unfold.
