One of the hottest "political" topics in the airline industry this year has been the battle for Open Skies, going on between the “big three” US carriers (American, Delta, and United) and the “big three” Gulf carriers (Emirates, Etihad, and Qatar). As I’ve explained, I think the US carriers are right for expressing their grievances,…
Continue reading: JetBlue Sides With Gulf Carriers On Open Skies… Sort Of
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The big three should stop whining and instead make their airline better so Americans actually WANT to fly them. That will speak louder than any argument they make in the press about unfair subsidies.
Zuckman must smoking some good stuffs.. TATL JV partners offer lower fares? LOL. Everyone remember days when it's reasonable to find $400-500 deals to Europe.
Btw, good reminder why competition is good for customers.. LH and KLM announced massive investment to improve their products. Kudos for trying to improve instead of sit and whine like US3
@washeelers: KLM and LH had some of the most outdated, awful hard product of any airline. They still don't have lie-flat seats in business across their whole fleets. Ever tried the old KLM and LH seats? I'd rather sit in economy, honestly.
So they are in fact lagging many years behind the big 3 US carriers in that respect (UA has had lie-flat seats for years, DL even better seats now for a couple of years, AA is getting close to have great lie-flat seats across their whole international fleet). The "massive investment" of LH and KLM is about 10 years too late, and won't be finished for about another year.
Also the big 3 have a lot of new planes on order etc so I don't know where you get the idea they're not investing in their product.
It's long been my hope that Jetblue can grow further into an international airline - if they do, I will switch to them exclusively as I prefer them to any US airline. Already I'm thrilled with "Mint"!