N702VL, a former Southwest 737-700 departs BUR in September, 2021. – Photo: JL Johnson
Long-time readers know we here at AirlineReporter LOVE an opportunity to try out new airlines and AvGeek experiences. Given that, we regret it has taken us so long to try new(ish) airline Avelo which launched in April of 2021. On the West Coast, this airline operates primarily out BURbank airport, just a hop, skip, and a $60 ride-share north from LAX.
We managed to get out to BUR last September to gawk at their fleet, but it took us a full additional year to be in the right place at the right time to finally get our opportunity to fly. Thankfully, following #SpotLAX2022, we had a bit of extra time to give them a shot for a quick trip up to Boise.
Finally, an Avelo Airlines Review!
Sample seat map featuring various seating preferences. +5 inches of legroom was GREAT. – Image: Aveloair.com
Avelo Airlines Review: Booking
The booking process was not efficient, but that’s the norm these days. And while I would love to, I can’t fault Avelo for it. Even legacy carriers gum up the works pushing up-sells and various add-ons. Not long ago we used to joke “ULCCs (ultra-low-cost-carriers) are gonna ULCC”, but it’s hard to criticize when even the old guard is doing it. That sweet ancillary revenue is just too hard to pass up, so why not follow the path ULCCs have long since pioneered and normalized?
My Frontier chariot arrives DEN – Photo: Kevin Horn
During the year 2016, my partner and were living 1,200 miles apart. We wanted to spend as much time together as possible without missing work or going bankrupt in the process. We needed to take advantage of every chance we came across to spend as much time together as we could. As it turned out, we learned very quickly the ups and downs of this jet-setting lifestyle through lots of flights on low- and ultra-low-cost carriers (LCC and ULCC, respectively). The ULCC business model is not without its share of controversy, but if they weren’t available for us, our year wouldn’t have been nearly as great as it turned out to be.
My partner Natalie and I met in early 2015 while I was stationed at Wright Patterson Air Force Base in Dayton, Ohio. I was nearing the end of my assignment to earn a Master’s degree with a follow-on assignment to Colorado Springs as an instructor at the U.S. Air Force Academy. Natalie was in the middle of a five-year PhD in Clinical Psychology. Through shared passions for adventure and fitness, we hit it off immediately but we also knew that my move to Colorado would be tough. We started traveling to see each other in the fall of 2015, and developed a rhythm of visiting every three weeks or so. These visits were great and fueled both of our passions for travel and adventure. As winter came, we knew we wanted to spend even more time together despite being so far apart during the week.
For the new year 2016, we set the ambitious goal of seeing each other every other weekend for the entire year. We had two major travel seasons coinciding with the spring and fall semesters of her program. We planned to spend the summer together which would provide a break from the hectic flight schedule and allow time for the bank account and credit card point balances to recharge. With the plan set, we went about attacking a personal travel schedule busier than either of us had ever done before.
As a six-year-old kid growing in a tier-2 city in India back in the 90s, the only modes of transportation I was familiar with were trains and buses. Flying was a distant dream, primarily because we had no airport and because flying back then was an expensive luxury only a few could afford.
Fast forward twenty years and there are at least a dozen international airports in India with virtually every important city connected by a domestic airline route. Flights are affordable, perhaps even equivalent to the A/C sleeper coaches on trains. Thanks to the emerging low-cost airlines, the likes of Indigo, Go Air, Air Asia, Spicejet, and more, flying today in India is no more seen as a mark of status that it once was. It has become more of a way for the masses to travel within and out of the world’s second-most-populous country. But will the young folks flying for the first time today be able to fall in love with aviation as I did in my childhood? Or will they just see it as a basic form of transportation?
A Spirit Airlines Airbus A321 wearing the Bare Fare livery at TPA – Photo: JL Johnson | AirlineReporter
I paid a mere $16.11 for a one-way Spirit Airlines Bare Fare flight from Kansas City to Dallas. Crazy, right? It gets crazier $14.24 of that ticket went to the “Government’s Cut,” (Spirit’s words, not mine) that is, various government-imposed fees and taxes. Of the remainder, a single penny went towards the base fare, with the final $1.86 going to what Spirit refers to as “Unintended Consequences of DOT Regulations.” Depending on where you sit on the regulatory fence, the actual revenue from my Bare Fare was either a penny or $1.87.
Spirit Airlines Bare Fare cost structure breakdown – Image: Spirit.com
Either way, the airline was bound to make money off of me from their various fees, right? After all, that’s what Spirit is known for: evil fees. But, what if I went totally bare and instead just paid only for “ass plus gas” (again, Spirit’s words, not mine). Do people actually do that? I did… for science.
Line up of planes at FLL – Photo: Maarten Visser | Flickr CC
Although Fort Lauderdale Hollywood International Airport (FLL) is a mere 21 miles north of its huge cousin, Miami International Airport (MIA), it’s worlds apart in its focus and business model. FLL is a hub for low-cost carriers (LCCs) and ultra-low-cost carriers (ULCCs), and funnels passengers to nearby Port Everglades, one of the busiest cruise ship terminals in the world. In 2014, FLL saw almost 25 million passengers use its facilities, led by ULCCs and LCCs Allegiant, JetBlue, Southwest, Virgin America, and Spirit, which is based at FLL.
Trans-Atlantic LCC, Norwegian Air Shuttle, also serves FLL with Boeing 787s. A number of U.S., Canadian, and Latin American airlines also provide non-stop scheduled service to FLL, along with seasonal charter carriers.
’œWe complement MIA,’ says Allan Siegel, FLL’s Community Outreach Coordinator. ’œBut our landing fees are lower, so our airlines are saving significant costs. That makes us attractive to the LCCs, and in 2014, LCCs handled 62% of our total traffic.’ The airport’s traffic has grown steadily, up 25% in 10 years, but that growth led to capacity issues, driven by FLL’s configuration.
