No. 1: The five-year-old discount carrier was ranked first in a recent J.D. Power survey of passengers.

By Meredith Cohn

Sun Staff

Posted March 15 2005

Is JetBlue the next Southwest?

The five-year-old airline has been the talk of the industry of late, landing atop customer satisfaction surveys, including one released yesterday, and creating enough buzz to influence an industry full of rivals many times its size.

``JetBlue does have a larger-than-life image,`` said Robert W. Mann Jr., president of the airline consulting firm R.W. Mann & Co. in Port Washington, N.Y. ``There are not too many markets where it even appears. ... But we`re already seeing its influence. It has great PR and people talk about JetBlue. It`s setting the standard.``

Unlike Southwest Airlines Co., which set a standard for low fares, JetBlue Airways Corp. is setting a standard for frills, he said.

JetBlue launched service with all new airplanes that were equipped with leather seats that contained television sets.

In a survey released yesterday, JetBlue ranked No. 1 in customer satisfaction in a May-October poll of 2,600 passengers conducted by J.D. Power and Associates, the marketing research firm.

Southwest was ranked second, followed by Delta Air Lines Inc. Customers praised the airline for the ease of making a reservation, employee courtesy and presentation.

JetBlue has ranked at the top of other industry surveys over the past two years, including one conducted by the Aviation Institute at the University of Nebraska and Wichita State University, and another in Conde Nast Traveler magazine.

Industry observers say airlines can no longer differentiate themselves on price alone, so they try to offer extra perks to give customers more for their money. After JetBlue, AirTran Airways added satellite radio and Southwest added leather seats.

Mann said Southwest is known as a maverick in the industry, more used to being copied than copying others, but it has made some moves that reflect the increasingly competitive industry.

Recently, the Dallas-based airline began offering online check-in on the day of a flight and free, inflight movie downloads on passenger computers.

Eventually, Mann said, Southwest will have to consider providing inflight entertainment and assigning seats in advance of flights.

Southwest remains the only major carrier not to assign seats. Passengers line up and board according to when they arrived at the airport, although Southwest last year began allowing ticket-holders to reserve seats online the same day as their flight. The arrangement helps keep the airline flying on time and efficiently, Southwest has said.

A Southwest spokeswoman said yesterday that if the airline does add seat assignments, it will not be because of JetBlue.

``We`ve always looked at ways to be different,`` said Whitney Eichinger, the spokeswoman. ``And low fares were different for so long that we now have to remind customers of what else we offer, like really great customer service. We are aware of what others are doing, but we see what makes sense for us.``

Southwest has been so successful, it has been credited with revitalizing airports where it flies. Baltimore-Washington International Airport - in the midst of adding a terminal for the airline - and Philadelphia International Airport, among others, have seen huge passenger growth since Southwest landed there.

JetBlue is having similar effect in places like New York, where many fliers have shifted from other airports to John F. Kennedy International Airport, where JetBlue is based. Dulles International Airport in Northern Virginia has several JetBlue flights a day to California and Florida.

While acknowledging that Southwest and JetBlue offer good customer service, some analysts say both look good in polls in part because other airlines look bad. Major carriers, which have lost billions of dollars since the 2001 terrorist attacks, have cut amenities such as meals, pillows and customer service.

Terry Tripler, an airline industry expert in Minneapolis, added that JetBlue remains much smaller than Southwest. It carried 11.7 million passengers last year, compared with 81 million for Southwest.

``It`s a little easier to please more people,`` he said. ``Southwest is huge and has more chances to have a problem. If the weather is bad, maybe four planes full of JetBlue people are upset, while 100 planes full of Southwest or American Airlines are upset.``

JetBlue acknowledges the ``Southwest effect`` on the industry. Todd Burke, a JetBlue spokesman, said the airline has probably taken more out of Southwest and other carriers` playbooks than it has forced on competitors. He also said Jet- Blue officials do not believe the airline tops customer satisfaction surveys because of frills like TV and the airline`s signature blue potato chips.

``What brought people to JetBlue was they heard there were low fares and really cool televisions, but when we polled them again after their first experience, they didn`t say the same things,`` Burke said. ``They say `You treated me well.` It`s about bringing humanity back to air travel.``