JetBlue Beginnings and Operational Methods
Steve Brindza
Ohio Dominican University
JetBlue Beginnings and Operational Methods
This section details the history of JetBlue, focusing on the activities of founder, David Neeleman. JetBlue Airways, based in Forest Hills, New York, was founded in February, 1999, by David Neeleman, the son of Mormon missionaries. He was born in Sao Paolo, Brazil, but raised in a tightly-knit Mormon family (Gajilan, 2003). After serving as a Brazilian missionary during college, Neeleman returned to his family’s base in Salt Lake City and began an enterprising condominium rental business. As a tenacious seller, Neeleman’s approach caught the eye of June
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Similarly, Neeleman investigated meal service and found that customers would be satisfied with light snacks and sodas in lieu of lunch and dinner entrees. JetBlue saved roughly $3 per passenger by cutting out meal service (Barney and Hesterly, 2010), but selected premier-label snacks, such as Terra Blue potato chips (Gajilan, 2003). The notable cost-saver was utilizing flight crews to clean airline cabins after each flight, which was inspired by the similar team player culture found at Southwest. Special cleaning crews were not needed, and JetBlue was able to speed airplane turnaround time to 35 minutes. This number was substantially below the industry average of one hour, and the quicker turnaround was implemented largely to sell more flights daily (Gajilan, 2003). Neeleman utilized his knowledge of electronic ticketing and Internet-based reservations to further reduce staff engaging in customer transactions. A major operational cost saving involved entering the major air industry with a new fleet of Airbus aircraft. Although European made, Airbus was chosen due to their fuel efficiency, easier maintenance, and five-year warranty (Gajilan, 2003). Neeleman realized that quick turnaround time was a crucial factor in maximizing profits by simply keeping the new planes in the air longer than the competition. Because JetBlue worked largely out of secondary airports (Midway vs. O’Hare), its flights avoided more
Before David Neeleman’s non-compete agreement with Southwest Airlines expired, he envisioned the concept of starting a low-fare airline that would combine common sense, innovation, and technology and bring the humanity back into air travel (Gittel & O’Reilly, 2001). In 1998, JetBlue was born. In order for David to fulfill his goal of a “do-it-right” kind of airline, he needed to recruit superior industry veterans who were willing to start from scratch and place an emphasis on employees and customers. Each of these individuals, from the President, General Counsel, CFO, and the HR director, wanted to create an airline that was fun, had
David Neeleman, CEO of JetBlue Airways and his management team have realized that JetBlue is still making profit despite the many challenges facing the airline industry after the September 11th 2001 terrorist attacks. Despite these positive returns; JetBlue plans on raising capital through an Initial Public Offering (IPO) to support its aggressive growth and to also offset portfolio losses to their venture capital
1. There are a few trends in the US airline industry. One is consolidation, wherein existing players merge in an attempt to lower their costs and generate operating synergies. The most recent major merger was the United Continental merger, which is still an ongoing affair, but has created the largest airline in the United States by market share (Martin, 2012). Another trend is towards low-cost carriers. In the US, Southwest has been a long-running success and JetBlue a strong new competitor, but in other countries this business model has proven exceptionally successful. The third major trend is the upward trend in jet fuel prices, and the increasing importance that this puts on hedging fuel prices and capacity management (Hinton, 2011).
JetBlue Airways Corporation was formed in August 1998 as a low-fare, low-cost but high service passenger airline serving select United States market. JetBlue's operations strategy was designed to achieve a low cost, whilst offering customers a pleasing and differentiated flying experience. JetBlue has had a successful business model and strong financial results during that period, and performed well in comparison to other airline companies in the US during the period between 2000 and 2003. It had been the only other airline apart from Southwest airlines, to have been profitable during the aftermath of the September 11, 2001
Founded by the discount airline veteran David Neeleman in 2000, JetBlue Airways has quickly become one of the largest discount airlines in the United States. Starting primarily by serving the East Coast, the airline has since expanded throughout the country and entered the international market. The reasons for its early success are numerous: JetBlue entered the market with one of the largest levels of liquidity of any start-up airline; it met the needs of customers’ whose primary concerns are price and route; and it successfully defined its brand and differentiated itself
Jet-blue Airways is American low cost airline head quartered near New-York city. It’s foundedin August 1998 by David Neeleman with Joel Peterson as a chairman and David Barger as apresident and CEO. By late 2006,like some other airlines, JetBlue faced some softening demand and high cost due to the increase in fuel prices. Barger realizes that JetBlue needs to take further steps to slow its rate of growth. Barger was not sure about the reductions across E190 and A320. The E190 showedpromising growth opportunities and challenges for JetBlue. At the same time, the A320 wasconsidered as proven plane that had succeededover past 6 years. Most of the airline industries were using hub-and-spoke system and point-to-point services. Due to this service, South West Airlines showed consistent profits. After September 11th, the airline industry experienced trouble due to attack. Looking at the history of Jet-blue, it started with just 10airplanes in 2000 and by 2011 the company planned to have 290 planes in service. To support customers, Jet Blueprovided
Flight 001 is a company founded by two frequent travelers who are also entreprenuers. Brad and John co-founded Flight 001 in 1999 and today they have stores in the U.S. and also overseas. The two wanted to create a store that sells all of the travel necessities that they would normally spend days looking for. Today, Flight 001 is a go to destination for celebrities and the wealthy.
There are two major strategic issues facing JetBlue. The first is that the company is growing very rapidly. This brings with it a number of critical challenges, such as recruitment and selection, maintaining the corporate culture, and maintaining high service levels. Secondary goals associated with this are maintaining safety standards, finding profitable routes to occupy and avoiding a unionization drive. Growing a company this rapidly is possible given the strong initial financing that the company has, but challenging in that the faster the airline grows, the more difficult it will be to find the right people and the right routes. The company can grow rapidly while plucking the low-hanging fruit but these tasks become more difficult over time.
David Neelman realized his vision of creating an airlines company that is focused on customer service by starting JetBlue. During
The future of the industry is in JetBlue’s “cheap chic” style. Airlines need to maintain a cost effective price point while also not appearing cheap. Small
JetBlue was established in 1999, and was the third airline start-up for founder and CEO David Neeleman. Neeleman managed to gather $130 million, the most ever raised for a start-up airline, from investors that included Chase Capital and financier George Soros. With the large start-up capital he purchased new Airbus A320 jets equipped with satellite TV, a first in the industry. In 2004 the company ordered an additional 30 new A320 aircrafts from Airbus. The airlines first flight was from New York to Fort Lauderdale in 2000. During the year, the airline added nine more destinations in California, Florida, New York, Utah, and
David Neeleman found JetBlue in 1999 with the mission “to bring humanity back to air travel". This goal is achieved by creating a company that offers comfortable, friendly travel at low fares and by this to differentiate themselves from the mass.
David Neelman realized his vision of creating an airlines company that is focused on customer service by starting JetBlue. During
JetBlue is an American airline company whose headquarter is located in the New York City. They are a low-cost airline who is rapidly growing in the Unites States. According to Wikipedia, “David Neeleman founded the company in February 1999, under the name "NewAir.” Many of their approach come from Southwest Airlines include low prices airfares. However, they differ in the amenities offered to the customers.
JetBlue’s product can be considered innovate in terms some of their products are unique and new. They exchanged new experience among their flights and the relationship with their customer’s. They adapt their products with the customer’s wants and demands, this means that their products exceptionally implement to make customers happy but also to distinguish them for the competitors. For example the new seats or the foods and beverage that are full time serve to the customer’s. Another exchanged is customer’s feed-back and the improvement of their services by having a strategy to become more popular.