MARKETING JETBLUE AIRWAYS ter earnings call on 26 April that for Mint was especially crucial on Mint has continued to exceed all of the US west coast, where JetBlue the airline’s expectations. is not as well known as some of its “In the last 12 months, both peers. JetBlue’s average Mint cus- New York to Los Angeles and San tomer flies once every four to six Francisco produced double-digit weeks. Strong consistent sales in unit revenue growth every single Mint have helped to keep fares month,” says Hayes. low, says Perry. The airline itself had underes- “Not only did they do Mint, timated how successful Mint they branded their fares, which would be. “We created something means they took product away that had a disruptive effect,” says from customers but it still went JetBlue Perry. “You don’t want to be positively,” said a panel judge. overconfident but we underesti- Despite billing Mint as a pre- “People would go to hen JetBlue Airways mated the significant impact.” mium product, the airline says parties and be told introduced a US trans- Given the results produced by Mint is never intended to repli- Wcontinental premium Mint, it might surprise the indus- cate the premium cabins on its they’ve got to fly this product – dubbed Mint – in mid- try to hear that the airline had not rivals that are usually flown by new product” 2014, the airline industry looked devoted a lot of time to what business travellers who work for askance at the carrier. What were Perry calls “traditional” market- major corporations. No curtain Jamie Perry Vice-president of marketing, JetBlue lie-flat seats doing on the aircraft of ing besides a small amount of separates Mint and JetBlue’s reg- an airline that calls itself low-cost? print advertising. ular core cabin, Perry points out. “We were certainly nervous,” “Truth be told, we didn’t do an “We deliberately did not JetBlue’s vice-president of market- awful lot of marketing in the tra- design the product to appeal to ing Jamie Perry tells Flight Airline ditional sense,” he says. Instead, the George Clooney, ‘Up In The Business. Having a premium the carrier chose to produce a Air’ road-warrior type,” says product on board was a “big phil- series of videos – called MINTro- Perry. Rather, the airline was osophical shift” for the carrier, he ducing – to showcase what cus- focused on two groups of peo- says. tomers can expect on board in ple: those who were willing to Corporate customers in Boston Mint, may it be the wine selec- spend a bit more of their own – which is one of JetBlue’s focus cit- tion or post-meal ice-cream. money for a better product, and ies – didn’t warm up to Mint when Perry believes that the biggest business travellers who are self- the idea was first floated to them. driver of Mint’s success is the employed or working for small “They said that wasn’t something way JetBlue priced the fares – at and medium-sized enterprises they were looking for,” says Perry. about 25% to 30% lower than who had more control over their But JetBlue pushed on, justify- fares in premium cabins on trans- Ghim-Lay Yeo ing Mint as necessary to lift reve- continental flights operated by nue performance on its US trans- the US legacy carriers. continental routes, which was “The low prices encouraged trial lagging behind US mainline car- and when people tried the product, riers that offer premium lie-flat they are so enamoured with it, they seats to the strong corporate traf- come back and tell their friends fic that flew across the country. and family about it,” he says. “Peo- Right off the bat, Mint turned ple would go to parties and they out to be a runaway success for Jet- were being told, ‘You’ve got to fly Blue. Chief executive Robin Hayes this new product’.” JetBlue said during the airline’s first quar- This word-of-mouth promotion Perry: The price has to be right SPONSORED BY PAST WINNERS 2015 Virgin America | 2014 British Airways | 2013 Turkish Airlines | 2012 Virgin Australia | 2011 Air New Zealand | 2010 JetBlue Airways | 2009 Lufthansa | 2008 Etihad Airways | 2007 Singapore Airlines | 2006 Emirates | 2005 Southwest Airlines | 2004 LAN | 2003 JetBlue Airways | 2002 EasyJet flightglobal.com/airlines 2016 | The Airline Strategy Awards | 15 ABA_150716_015.indd 15 30/06/2016 14:45.