Southwest Airlines Co. (NYSE: LUV) today announced plans to complement its growing portfolio of international routes by offering nonstop service between Los Angeles International Airport and Daniel Oduber Quiros International Airport in Liberia/Guanacaste, Costa Rica beginning in April 2016. Southwest® expects to operate the service daily from LAX Terminal 2, adjacent the carrier’s domestic operation in LAX Terminal 1. Flights will be available for purchase early next year at Southwest.com and are subject to foreign government approval.
“This new link for our Customers in the LA Basin to Costa Rica’s growing resort and ecotourism region will bring to the market a value only Southwest can offer with bags fly free*, no change fees, and low fares, all alongside our famously friendly Customer Service,” said Andrew Watterson, Southwest Airlines Senior Vice President of Network & Revenue Management. “We proudly carry more passengers to and from California airports than any other airline and continue to invest in the Golden State by adding new short, medium, and long-haul service this year from all nine of our California airports.”
The new international service comes as Southwest achieves several milestones in a revitalization of its LAX facilities at Terminal 1. As part of the $508 million modernization project unfolding now in partnership with Los Angeles World Airports, a new ticketing lobby and baggage claim facility is set to open early next year. Additional facility construction will bring new entrances, additional capacity in the security checkpoint expected to open in 2017, new food options, and an overall enhanced Customer experience. The project is expected to be completed fully by 2018.
“I’m pleased to welcome Southwest Airlines’ first new international route out of LAX,” said Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti. “This new international flight will contribute to the expanding relationship between Southern California and Latin America while bringing over $600 million annually to our local economy and supporting thousands of jobs for Angelenos.”
Southwest Airlines began flying to California in 1982 and now serves nine airports in the Golden State, offering more daily departures in California than any other airline. 143 of those flights takeoff and land within the state, connecting 18 unique city-pair combinations within California. By summer 2016, Southwest’s nine California airports will offer Customers a combined peak weekday schedule of 678 departures to destinations across the United States, Mexico, and Costa Rica.
Following its launch of service in April 2013 to the U.S. Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, Southwest began its international journey in July 2014 with service to three Caribbean nations and, after adding service points across the Caribbean, Mexico, and Central America, will end 2015 ‘twelve for twelve,’ so to speak: the carrier now serves a dozen destinations across Latin America and the Caribbean from a dozen gateway airports on the U.S. mainland. Los Angeles International Airport (LAX) will become the carrier’s thirteenth gateway airport in the 48 contiguous states.
“We are just getting started with a service footprint outside the U.S. mainland designed to offer the more than 100 million People who fly with us every year international opportunities to connect with what’s important to them,” Watterson said. “Our list of opportunities is long and Liberia, Costa Rica is just the beginning of the international destinations we plan to offer from LAX.”
Southwest Airlines
Southwest Airlines shares take a nose dive
Southwest Airlines was the biggest decliner on the S&P 500 on Tuesday after the carrier lowered its outlook for a fourth-quarter revenue metric.
The Dallas-based airline said it expected revenue per available seat mile, a measure of airline efficiency, to be “flat to down 1.0 per cent” in the current quarter, compared with a year ago. Its previous forecast had been for 1 per cent growth.
“The company’s unit revenue weakness is likely due to leaving low-fare buckets open longer than initially expected,” said Helane Becker, an analyst at Cowen & Co.
Southwest said it had flown 9.7bn revenue passenger miles, a gauge of passenger traffic, in November, an increase of 13.9 per cent from a year ago.
But it was the downbeat outlook on which investors focused, sending shares in Southwest, which have advanced nearly 9 per cent this year, 7 per cent lower to $46.10.
Airline stocks have come under pressure this year from concerns that carriers will boost capacity and cut ticket prices in an effort to win market share.
The news sent the NYSE Arca airline index, which includes global carriers, down 2.3 per cent, trimming the sector’s gains of the past two days on the back of lower oil prices.
A US antitrust regulator’s move to block its acquisition of rival Office Depot prompted an analyst downgrade that pushed shares in Staples 4.6 per cent lower to $10.16.
The Federal Trade Commission filed a complaint on Monday to block the $6.3bn deal, arguing that the proposed merger would “significantly” reduce competition and drive up prices for consumers.
KeyBanc downgraded Staples from “overweight” to “sector weight” and removed its price target.
“Following Monday’s news, we are unable to estimate the likelihood of a deal, and are left with concerns about the underlying businesses,” said analyst Bradley Thomas.
Shares in Chipotle found no relief after it said it had closed one of its restaurants in Boston while it investigated “a number of illnesses among Boston college students”.
But the Mexican restaurant chain said it did “not have any evidence” to suggest the incident was related to an E.coli outbreak.
The Denver-based company’s sales trends have been “extremely volatile” in the current quarter after an outbreak of the infectious illness was linked to its restaurants.
Shares in United Natural Foods fell 17 per cent to $34.54 after it cut its full-year outlook and reported disappointing fiscal first-quarter earnings.
The organic foods distributor expects 2016 revenue in a range of $8.43 to $8.59bn, below its previous estimates for $8.51bn-$8.67bn. This compared with Wall Street’s estimates for $8.48bn.
Net income fell nearly 9 per cent to $30.1m, or 60 cents a share, in the three months to the end of October, below analysts’ expectations.
A third day of declines in oil prices weighed on US stocks, but with the sell-off in Southwest’s shares it was the industrials sector that fell the most on the benchmark S&P 500.
At midday the S&P 500 was down 0.6 per cent to 2,064.68, the Dow Jones Industrial Average had declined 0.8 per cent to 17,589.54 and the Nasdaq Composite was 0.2 per cent lower at 5,090.69.
Financial Times
Sorry, you can’t fly because you speak Arabic!
A Philadelphia pizza shop owner and his friend had to call 911 in Chicago’s Midway airport Wednesday night in order to get on their flight home.
Maher Khalil and Anas Ayyad said they were profiled — asked to step aside during the boarding process because a fellow passenger said he was afraid to fly with them.
“If that person doesn’t feel safe, let them take the bus,” Khalil said to a Southwest Airlines gate agent. “We’re American citizens just like everybody else.”
Khalil, 29 and Ayyad, 28, moved to Philadelphia from Palestine 15 years ago. Khalil now owns the Feltonville pizza shop — Pizza Point — that gave him his first job. The friends were in Chicago visiting each other’s families and met back at the airport Wednesday night to take the same flight home. The gate agent told them apologetically they wouldn’t be allowed to board because a passenger was afraid to fly with them after overhearing the men speaking Arabic.
“I didn’t know what to do, so I called the cops,” Khalil said.
The flight was delayed and the two men were ultimately allowed to board after being questioned again by airport security and police. The airline issued a statement acknowledging a brief disagreement with two customers.
A second Southwest flight from Chicago to Houston was also delayed Wednesday night when passengers refused to allow six Muslims on the flight. The Muslim passengers had to be rebooked on another flight.
“Safety is our primary focus, and our Employees are trained to make decisions to ensure that safety, and to safeguard the security of our Crews and Customers on every flight,” the airline’s statement read.
Some passengers were very supportive, Khalil said, but others made the flight home outright uncomfortable.
“We’re walking down the aisle and I’d already told him [Ayyad] to smile and act like nothing was wrong. But then people kept asking me, ‘What’s in that box?!’ I was carrying a small white box. And the passengers made me open the box!”
“So I shared my baklava with them.”
NBC Chicago