American Airlines

[Ray Finkle]

Looking at the AA website as of Friday 18th Dec BHX goes back to daily, although no flight on Christmas Day, it's showing daily up until January 8th, which is as far as can be booked at the moment.

No doubt it's for the expected Christmas rush and will drop again throughout Feb but it's good to see nonetheless.

Also I've just had a look at the May school holidays and there are only two economy seats left ex BHX on the Saturday, Sunday looks to be healthy too.

 

[Ash]

Haven't seen much traditional advertising for the route, I don't think they even bothered to give it a mention on the AA.com homepage, outside of a small corporate press release? I still remember the US Airways PHL adverts on buses everywhere in town.

 

[Brum X]

Looking at the AA website as of Friday 18th Dec BHX goes back to daily, although no flight on Christmas Day, it's showing daily up until January 8th, which is as far as can be booked at the moment.

No doubt it's for the expected Christmas rush and will drop again throughout Feb but it's good to see nonetheless.

Also I've just had a look at the May school holidays and there are only two economy seats left ex BHX on the Saturday, Sunday looks to be healthy too.

Thats good to hear, i really want AA to be successful and to co-exist with United.

 

[Ray Finkle]

Haven't seen much traditional advertising for the route, I don't think they even bothered to give it a mention on the AA.com homepage, outside of a small corporate press release? I still remember the US Airways PHL adverts on buses everywhere in town.

I haven't seen anything either, just the articles on the BHX website. I haven't seen anything for Vueling either, maybe something will happen closer to the date.

 

[Ray Finkle]

Looking at the AA website as of Friday 18th Dec BHX goes back to daily, although no flight on Christmas Day, it's showing daily up until January 8th, which is as far as can be booked at the moment.

No doubt it's for the expected Christmas rush and will drop again throughout Feb but it's good to see nonetheless.

The website currently goes up to January 22nd and is still showing as daily.

 

[Ray Finkle]

The website is well into Feb now and still showing daily.

I'm not sure if this is a provisional timetable with changes still to be made or whether it's the final one. It does seem slightly odd that American go back to daily at the same time that United usually reduce frequency, unless that is their plan.

Time will tell.

Seven weeks today it starts and apart from BHX Twitter I've not seen or heard any advertising, has anyone else?

 

[justplanecrazy]

I've seen a few billboards and heard radio adverts

 

[Brum X]

The website is well into Feb now and still showing daily.

I'm not sure if this is a provisional timetable with changes still to be made or whether it's the final one. It does seem slightly odd that American go back to daily at the same time that United usually reduce frequency, unless that is their plan.

Time will tell.

Seven weeks today it starts and apart from BHX Twitter I've not seen or heard any advertising, has anyone else?

American Airlines has today featured on the Birmingham post webpage.

 

[Ash]

Hints of potential expansion to further AA gateways by UK Director of Sales in this article:

http://www.insidermedia.com/insider/midlands/135995-/

 

[Ray Finkle]

Great find, thanks for posting :s_thumbsup

If we do get another destination in the future then I'd imagine Chicago would be the obvious choice, although if connections to the Caribbean and South America are strong then we could possibly see a seasonal Miami.

All depends on JFK though, I hope it does well

 

[BHXsupporter]

Re: American Airlines and other destinations

Having read the link above I'm quite surprized by it. In it AA say '...it will also give us a sense of where the demand is for other cities and where we might be able to service additional destinations'. Surely they could have accessed current market data for the Midlands (which we hope BHX has at its fingertips) or if not undertaken it or sponsored it themselves?

I have needs to travel to both Canada and parts of the States but my only direct BHX access is seasonal Toronto or New York up till now with United to Newark. I somehow don't feel it's a good use of my time flying 1-2 h eastwards to EU hubs before doubling back so Icelandair is now an alternative over the struggle and expense to and from Heathrow.

I feel BHX and the West Midlands (or whatever 'Midlands Powerhouse (!) we should be called to embrace inclusion of Coventry, Rugby, Derby, Northampton, Shrewsbury, Stoke-on-Trent etc) has to be brave and subsidize start-up long-haul routes where they know from data that a local service would be used. I could cope for business with a twice weekly long-haul destination and for vacations simply once weekly would be fine for me.

 

[DaveBham]

As with any new service, use it or lose it.

Buy tickets, book holidays, tell your friends, and work colleagues about AA's BHX-JFK service. Businesses need to made aware of the service especially. I hope AA invest in plenty of advertising like Turkish and Emirates do, because there are still midlands travellers to the US that don't know about the United service to EWR, and that's been going for years.

 

[Ray Finkle]

As with any new service, use it or lose it.

Buy tickets, book holidays, tell your friends, and work colleagues about AA's BHX-JFK service. Businesses need to made aware of the service especially. I hope AA invest in plenty of advertising like Turkish and Emirates do, because there are still midlands travellers to the US that don't know about the United service to EWR, and that's been going for years.

Totally agree :drinks:

BHX has had some very good developments over the last couple of years, now it's time to tell everyone just what is available from their local airport.

 

[User0001]

In terms of potential routes, I would have thought Chicago and/or Philidelphia were the most likely.

 

[Ray Finkle]

A slightly more in depth article from the Birmingham Post. It's interesting that they are expecting this to reach pax from the South West and Wales, I hope BHX are preparing an advertising campaign in those areas, not just for this but for all our long haul, there are some affluent areas south of the Cotswolds that may be interested in an alternative to London.

American Airlines to spread the news of Birmingham

US airline says it is keen to promote city as a destination ahead of launch of flights to JFK Airport in May.

Birmingham has a valuable new ally in the battle to promote the city in the US – in the shape of the world's largest airline group.

American Airlines will start flights to JFK Airport in New York on May 8, as work begins to attract more Americans to the region.

David Thomas, UK director of sales at American Airlines, said with the city boasting a strong business offer alongside top restaurants, shops and sporting attractions, it was a significant alternative to automatically flying to London.

His comments came just weeks after Birmingham Airport started promoting itself as "Shakespeare's Airport" in China – and Mr Thomas believes a similar approach could yield results stateside.

He said: "Speaking as an American, if you were to ask where Shakespeare was from most would probably say London. So we want to promote how great it is here.

"We have to show this is an alternative to London Heathrow. A lot of people are scared of Heathrow and Birmingham has a lot to offer.

"There needs to be some PR in the States to show how easy it is to get here. Part of the reason Americans don't think of Birmingham as a place they can get to is because of the flights.

"Hopefully now we have this service it will naturally progress as people see it as an opportunity."

He added: "You have a lot to offer here, with things like Shakespeare and cricket, it's just getting the message out.

"The message about Birmingham gets lost behind London but there are great restaurants here and lots to see. Part of what we are trying to do is promote Birmingham as an alternative to London."

American Airlines expects the new route to provide nearly 100,000 seats a year.

It will complement the existing route between Birmingham and Newark operated by United Airlines.

The flights also represent a return of sorts for British Airways (BA), as it will be operated as a code share. That means the two airlines will share in the profits, flights from Birmingham can be booked on the BA website and the flights allow customers to earn and redeem BA air miles and Avios points.

Mr Thomas added: "BA doesn't fly here but we have a close relationship with BA and doing this strengthens our relationship with them.

"If we make a profit on this then BA does as well, so they are just as interested in seeing this work as we are."

The American Airlines flight will operate daily, arriving from JFK into Birmingham at 7.10am and depart for the return leg at 10am.

Mr Thomas said he was confident in the market and believed the Birmingham flights give American Airlines reach to customers in the west of England and Wales.

He said on top of business travellers and New York visitors, people looking to travel to Orlando were a large market, although presently direct flights to Orlando were not on the agenda.

He added: "There is strong local demand for JFK and we think there is a hole in the market.

"We also see an opportunity for people getting to the west coast – especially LA and San Francisco with services on our A321 aircraft. There is also strong demand to get to Orlando, Cancun and Las Vegas."

He added: "Every city is unique. The corporate base here is unique, so you'd expect a lot of corporate business out of Birmingham, whereas in Manchester there are also of people taking family trips out to the States. Birmingham is unique and for us you have to treat it so."

http://www.birminghampost.co.uk/busines ... D=sharebar

 

[Brum X]

After reading the above article, it does appear AA are upbeat about Birmingham and BHX. This is good to see.

 

[Ray Finkle]

It does sound positive and it appears as if American will be putting some effort into making the route work themselves aswell as BHX.

 

[andrew.clarkson]

Hi there ray and all, I know now that from 8th may this year 2015, that American Airlines start fly from bhx to jfk, but I think now is the time from Mr Kehoe and company to start serious negotiations in bringing back BA, even if it means telling them to name there price to return. Because once they have pursueded BA to come, it may wake up all the other big carriers to come as well...andyc

 

[Ray Finkle]

Ain't going to happen, no matter what the price. BA have their hub in London and that's where they will focus.

I'd like to see BHX work with Vueling to get a decent European network going, the flights would have a BA code share and would be bookable on the BA website, if they could be persuaded to do Madrid then it would open up Iberia's long haul network too. Other than that the code share with American is about as good as it will get, it's bookable on the BA site which should help and hopefully it could lead to more US destinations in the future.

 

[DaveBham]

BA's product isn't really aimed at Birmingham residents these days is it? Do they fly to anywhere but LHR from other UK airports? They're a good airline, but If they want my business again, they'll have to come to me, like AA,United, Emirates & Swiss do.