U.S. startup airline Breeze Airways has reported its first quarterly profit since its launch in May 2021.
Salt Lake City-based Breeze said on January 23 that this milestone is due in part to the maturation of its brands and national network, as well as demand for vacation travel that has overcome the dampening effect on bookings caused by the recent U.S. presidential election. He said it was due to.
Breeze Chief Financial Officer Trent Porter told FlightGlobal on January 22 that “we did see a slight decline in bookings in late October and early November.”
“Then we saw the economy pick up in late November and carry over into December.Given the strength we saw in the fourth quarter, what we were actually able to achieve was that the model predicted It was better than what I was doing.”
Breeze added approximately 30 new cities to its expanding network in 2024, increasing its passenger carrying capacity as measured by Available Seat Miles (ASM) by more than 50% year over year.
“In less than four years, we have successfully grown and scaled Breeze at an unprecedented rate while establishing solid market presence in dozens of underserved markets across the United States.” CEO David Neeleman said.
The low-cost airline said it generated more than $200 million in revenue in the October-December period and $680 million in revenue for the year, an increase of nearly 80% compared to 2023. .
Looking ahead, the first quarter will historically be Breeze's weakest three months of the year, thanks to its target market of leisure travelers. However, we expect a strong second quarter and potentially a profit for the full year 2025.
“Based on our first quarter metrics, we believe we have momentum and a model that allows us to continue to achieve these profitability numbers,” Porter said.
Much will depend on the extent of passenger capacity reductions implemented by Frontier Airlines, JetBlue Airways, Southwest Airlines, and Spirit Airlines, all of which are right-sizing their networks to ensure stable profitability.
“If the capacity controls that airlines are currently implementing continue, we certainly expect this to be a profitable year,” Porter said.
He acknowledged that Breeze, which prefers to identify routes with minimal competition, may leverage the Airbus A220-300 to enter certain markets as Frontier and Spirit exit. There is.
“We feel there are aircraft in the right gauge for certain markets,” he says. “They fly the A321 five or six times a week, so it really makes sense to fly the 137 seats two or three times a week.”
