Breeze Airways had the air carrier certificate awarded by the FAA on Friday, paving the way for its debut in the U.S. market in the coming weeks.
The new low cost airline by businessman David Neeleman (founder of companies such as JetBlue, Azul and WestJet) promises to innovate by offering cheaper tickets on direct flights between smaller airports.
According to One Mile At Time, the debut flight will be between Tampa and Charleston, which also revealed that Breeze will fly to 15 cities initially, including Nashville, New Orleans and Pittsburgh.
Neeleman even said that the focus will be on meeting the so-called Rust Belt and Solar Belt, regions in the east and southeast of the USA.
The FAA has authorized the new carrier to fly the E190 and E195 jets to 33 airports, but parts of them only for technical stopovers. Also included are cities like Orlando, Daytona Beach, Jacksonville, Providence and Richmond, among others.
In a second phase, Breeze will put its new Airbus A220-300 into service on long-haul routes and at larger airports.
The airline, however, has not yet given details about its service, which promises to be quite affordable and customizable. The Breeze website is still without information, but the official announcement of the routes and the opening of ticket sales are expected in the coming days.
Neeleman has already said that almost the entire process of buying, booking and checking-in at the airport will be done through a mobile application.
In order to offer attractive prices, Breeze is betting on a very low operating cost, but this strategy has drawn criticism from the airline that recently announced the hiring of university students for the position of flight attendants.
However, the negative reactions to the announcement made the company change its mind. So far, Breeze has five aircraft in its fleet, three E190 and two E195 leased.
