If it was not already apparent, immediately’s Southwest Airways is just not your mother and father’ Southwest.
Simply days after CEO Bob Jordan spoke of the potential for long-haul worldwide locations — assume Europe, not Kansas — the airline made its first displaying on the annual assembly of the worldwide aviation commerce group Worldwide Air Transport Affiliation in New Delhi. The assembly is a who’s who of senior aviation management the place offers get carried out.
Steven Swan, the managing director of worldwide at Southwest, acknowledged this throughout a sit-down in New Delhi.
“It is a huge change for us,” he stated.
Southwest first flew outdoors the U.S. in 2014 — AirTran Airways operated worldwide flights as a Southwest subsidiary previous to that — schedule information from aviation analytics agency Cirium reveals. However ever since then, the airline has been higher recognized for its home breadth than international attain.
“We perceive our prospects need to go locations outdoors of the nation as properly, and we would like to have the ability to present them with that chance,” stated Swan.
Simply displaying up in New Delhi is a logo, not less than to the airline trade, of Southwest’s internationalization.
And the potential for long-haul flights comes throughout a interval of dramatic change for the airline. Baggage stopped flying free final week. Further-legroom seats go on sale in October. And open seating ends early subsequent yr. After which there’s the potential for Southwest lounges, and even first-class, sooner or later.
New locations overseas are coming
Southwest has not added a brand new worldwide vacation spot since Cozumel Worldwide Airport (CZM) in 2020, Cirium schedules present. That is to not say it has not grown; the airline added 17 new U.S. locations starting from Miami Worldwide Airport (MIA) to Yampa Valley Regional Airport (HDN) close to Steamboat Springs within the Colorado mountains in the course of the COVID-19 pandemic.
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Home progress has slowed dramatically — the airline exited 4 cities, together with Cozumel, in 2024 — and Southwest is “transitioning again,” as Swan put it, to increasing its worldwide map.
Swan was diplomatic on the place the provider might go, paraphrasing former CEO Gary Kelly’s oft-repeated line about Southwest having 50 or so worldwide locations it might serve.
He did say that Southwest’s subsequent few worldwide additions would comply with the sample of the cities it already serves. That’s: leisure-heavy locations within the Caribbean, Mexico and Central America that cater to American vacationers.
After these cities come on-line, nevertheless, the sky is the restrict — or not less than the vary of one in all Southwest’s Boeing 737 MAX planes.
“We consider its first forays into long-haul worldwide service might contain connecting into Reykjavík, which is in vary for its [737] MAX 8s,” wrote Tom Fitzgerald, an airline analyst at TD Cowen, in a report Might 31. He cited Southwest’s present partnership with Icelandair and famous that the European service might “drive co-brand bank card spending by Speedy Rewards members.”
Requested to touch upon Fitzgerald’s report, Swan stated, “Something that’s throughout the MAX vary is interesting to us so as to add to the community.”
He added that Icelandair, which Southwest started connecting with at Baltimore/Washington Worldwide Thurgood Marshall Airport (BWI) in January, does a “unbelievable job.”
Speedy Rewards partnerships are within the works
One huge piece lacking from Southwest’s Icelandair partnership is loyalty. At the moment, it solely connects vacationers and checked luggage with the European provider’s flights at six U.S. airports.
Southwest is working towards offering prospects “the potential to make use of their Speedy Reward factors to journey wherever they need to go — if that is in Asia, or that is in Europe, or that is in Africa,” stated Swan.
The IT methods wanted to energy loyalty tie-ups, codeshares or extra are, as with so many issues expertise at Southwest, within the works, he defined.
Within the meantime, vacationers can look ahead to China Airways becoming a member of Icelandair as a Southwest companion in 2026. The tie-up with the Taiwanese provider will look a lot the identical: Vacationers can e-book flights on each airways throughout a single itinerary and the airways will switch checked luggage. Loyalty advantages and the rest are to come back.
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