STARK COUNTY

Breeze holding its own as it launches new Orlando flight at Akron-Canton Airport

Michael Mills unloads baggage from a Breeze Airways flight that arrived from Tampa on Friday at Akron-Canton Airport in Green.
Robert Wang
The Repository
  • Breeze Airways began service this month from Akron-Canton to Orlando
  • Breeze has survived a tumultuous 21 months in aviation.
  • But Breeze has not yet reached profitability.

GREEN – Breeze Airways faced some strong wind gusts in the airline industry when it debuted service at Akron-Canton Airport and other regional airports in 2021.

The airline, whose flight schedule now includes 35 airports, has won some respect for how it's overcome a pilot shortage, high jet-fuel prices, canceling or postponing the planned debut of service to some destinations, and competition from more established airlines.

But as it tries to grow to occupy a niche as a low-fare, point-to-point, non-hub airline at many medium-sized airports — some abandoned by larger airlines — can it win enough passengers to make a profit so it continues flying?

More flights:Breeze Airways will connect Akron-Canton to Orlando in March

Vegas, baby:Las Vegas is latest destination for Breeze Airways from Akron-Canton Airport

“We love Akron-Canton. We have a lot of cities that we're serving out of there. So it’s going well," Breeze CEO and founder David Neeleman said.

Earlier this month, Breeze launched a non-stop flight from Akron-Canton to Orlando International Airport — its eighth destination from Akron-Canton. The seven other destinations are Charleston, South Carolina; Las Vegas; Nashville; New Orleans; Norfolk, Virginia; Tampa and West Palm Beach. Breeze is scheduled to add Norfolk, Virginia on June 1, according to Akron-Canton Airport.

"Orlando is a great destination," Neeleman said. "I mean everyone likes to fly somewhere that people really want to go. We find that flights to Orlando do very well.”

Ren Camacho, president and CEO of the Akron-Canton Airport, said in a written statement that Orlando is a top destination for leisure travelers. “We are immensely grateful for Breeze’s growth and commitment to Northeast Ohio.”

Breeze Airways founder, CEO and Chairman David Neeleman speaks in November 2021 at the 107th annual Canton Regional Chamber of Commerce meeting held at MAPS Air Museum in Green.

Passengers rave about Breeze

A couple of passengers interviewed Friday morning at the airport after they disembarked from Breeze's 6:49 a.m. flight from Tampa praised the flight experience. The flight landed at 9:03 a.m., 20 minutes earlier than scheduled.

Domenic Ferrante, a principal architect with SōL Harris/Day Architecture who lives in Jackson Township, returned with his wife from a two-week vacation in Florida.

"It's a great flight. Real easy. The plane's brand new. Accomodations been great. So I will definitely fly again," Ferrante said. "The check-in's easy. The mobile app was real easy to use. I do like the idea of how they give you the option of having the nice, nicer and nicest in the sense of the a la carte (tier of amenities included)."

As for Breeze only having online-based customer service with no phone number, he said: "Well that's OK. Sometimes when you try to call Delta, you can't get a hold of anybody anyways."

But Ferrante acknowledged that because Breeze doesn't fly to a destination seven days a week, a passenger faces the risk of having to book with another airline to get home that day or the next day if Breeze cancels the flight. But he felt the risk was worth the discounted fare of $150 round trip to Tampa.

Christine Kress of Minerva was returning after a visit to see her son in St. Petersburg, Florida. She said it was her first time flying with Breeze.

"It was very nice. The plane was clean and it seemed a little more spacious than the other airline that I usually travel. And the flight crew was great. Everything was good," said Kress. "I'm so happy because I've always had to go out of Cleveland and it's wonderful that they're here in Canton. I can save that drive."

Jana Burson of Plain Township, who waited for her bag at baggage claim, said it was her fifth round trip with Breeze. She flies to Tampa to see her daughter and to Nashville to see her son.

"So far it's been on time. They're very friendly. It's so convenient. I like it and it's clean. It's great. I would prefer it over all the other airlines," Burson said, adding that she paid $280 for a round trip to Tampa at the "nice" tier including bag fees. She said she liked the new 150-seat Airbus A220-300 used for the flight from Tampa.

She said when she flew with a big legacy airline last year, the flight was canceled and she couldn't be rebooked on another flight for three more days. Burson said she would never fly with that airline again.

David Neeleman: 'Word gets out, and people fly us again.'

Breeze began flying to Akron-Canton in late June 2021 from Tampa after the airline launched operations in May 2021. Akron-Canton was then one of Breeze's roughly 16 airports. Within the next few weeks, Breeze added service to Charleston, South Carolina, and New Orleans.

Breeze operates about 28% of the airport's available flight seats, roughly tied with American Airlines. The top carrier is Allegiant at 33%. In the third quarter of 2021, Breeze had 170 flights from and to Akron-Canton with 19,080 available seats. Akron-Canton estimates Breeze will reach 530 flights with 63,764 seats by the third quarter of this year.

Sia'Terra Bradford checks tickets at a Breeze Airways gate for passengers headed to Tampa on Friday at Akron-Canton Airport in Green.

“Usually it starts out a little slow and it grows," said Neeleman, the founder of JetBlue who added that a new service usually takes six months or more to gain traction. “Word gets out, and people fly us again.”

Aviation analyst: Breeze has 'gone through a lot of trial and error.'

Henry Harteveldt, an aviation analyst and president of San Francisco-area-based Atmosphere Research Group had expressed skepticism to Business Insider in May 2021 that Breeze could compete against larger airlines.

But he's become impressed with how quickly Breeze is willing to drop routes that won't lead to a profit and how competitive the airline is on fares.

And he likes Breeze's strategy of focusing on regional airports like Akron-Canton where the larger competitors are more focused on their operations at larger airports, ceding the regional airport market to Breeze and budget airlines.

Most importantly, while Breeze is still losing money, it's raised a significant amount of money from investors. Breeze had closed a $200 million funding round in 2021. And while the future of the economy is uncertain, in an uncertain economy, budget fares are more likely to attract passengers.

Breeze, which is privately held, reported to the U.S. Department of Transportation that it had losses of nearly $116 million on operating revenue of about $98 million, from the fourth quarter of 2021 to the third quarter of 2022. Breeze's number of full-time equivalent employees jumped from 583 in January 2022 to 1,004 in December.

"They have gone through a lot of trial and error," Harteveldt said. "They have started the routes and if the routes don't perform they drop them. So I give them credit for being nimble. For trying to focus on running a good business as opposed to serving cities based on pride or anything else. ... It's very difficult because airline travelers are notoriously fickle and they’re not likely to be brand loyal. Which means Breeze like other budget airlines has to win customers one sale at a time.”

However, Harteveldt said Breeze is taking a risk by spending precious cash to buy an announced 80 of those Airbus A220-300s. And it has to pay higher salaries to attract pilots.

“Breeze has certainly defied a lot of odds," said Harteveldt. "I think the outlook for Breeze is better now than when the airline got started.”

Dan Kazmir of Tallmadge collects his luggage from baggage claim after arriving Friday at Akron-Canton Airport from Tampa on Breeze Airways in Green.

Breeze doesn't fly daily to destinations from Akron-Canton

While Breeze's fares may often be lower than that of legacy airlines with hubs, Breeze does not fly to Orlando and other destinations from Akron-Canton every day.

If a flight to a destination or back to Akron-Canton is canceled, a passenger may have to wait a couple days before they fly on another Breeze flight. Or they may have to find another way at the last minute to their destination or back home.

Neeleman said this month that 99.3% of Breeze's flights took place in February.

"If a flight gets canceled because of weather, that was 1 in 110 flights. You have pretty good odds. If we do (cancel), we take care of you. We compensate you," the Breeze CEO said.

Neeleman pointed out that in many cases if a passenger flies with a legacy airline, they're likely flying via a hub and not nonstop. It just takes a cancellation of any leg of the journey to disrupt their journey.

However, the legacy airlines usually fly daily through multiple hubs, giving them more capacity than point-to-point budget airlines to rebook passengers to other flights the same day or the next day.

Breeze last summer went through a period of canceling plans to debut service at certain airports due to difficulties of getting pilots and aircraft. Breeze dropped service from Akron-Canton to Hartford due to the difficulties of having enough staff.

Neeleman said about the airline's challenges, “things are not always easy but we are doing the best we can. It’s getting better. It was a lot of issues with supply chain and hiring, all that, but every month that passes it’s getting better there.”

'We’re smaller. We’re a little more nimble.'

In addition to Akron-Canton, Breeze flies from medium-sized airports like Northwest Arkansas, Long Island McArthur Airport, John Wayne Airport in Orange County near Los Angeles, San Bernardino/Riverside near Los Angeles, Provo Municipal Airport near Salt Lake City, Richmond, Sarasota/Bradenton in Florida, Hilton Head International near Savannah, Vero Beach Regional Airport in Florida and Westchester County Airport near New York City.

Breeze also has scheduled service to and from large airports that it doesn't fly to from Akron-Canton, such as Columbus, Cincinnati, Los Angeles International Airport, Phoenix, Pittsburgh, and San Francisco.

Neeleman said Breeze, which launched with 39 routes serving 16 cities, can successfully expand its model of focusing much of its network on medium-sized airports with less cost to operate in than large airports.

”We have 143 routes and all but maybe six or eight, we have no nonstop competition. So there’s no other flights to choose from than us as long as we do a good job of flying those flights, we’ll have a lot of happy customers," he said. “We’re smaller. We’re a little more nimble. We can, of course, adjust. Not that we’re perfect. ... When these big guys (large airlines) have a meltdown it’s hard to put Humpty Dumpty back together."

And Neeleman added that Breeze is capitalizing on larger airlines leaving airports like Akron-Canton, the most prominent examples locally being Southwest, which acquired AirTran and then left in 2017, and Delta Airlines, which ceased service here in 2020.

”Being in smaller airports, we get a lot of better rates at airports because we’re the only game in town," he said.

Reach Robert at robert.wang@cantonrep.com. Twitter: @rwangREP.