Denver & Nashville “Definitely” Next In Southwest-Icelandair Partnership

Icelandair became Southwest Airlines’ first interline partner when the two carriers announced their agreement in September this year. This was a ground-breaking development as it marked a shift in the Southwest Airlines strategy, away from its traditional model and towards something new that reinforces its service offering and ultimately its financial situation.

Named the “Southwest. Even Better.” transformation plan, it will see the carrier introduce things like premium seating, assigned seating, airline partnerships (beginning with Icelandair), vacation packages and red-eye flights that increase aircraft utilization.

As Southwest Airlines has several operating bases spread out across the United States, the two airlines had plenty to pick from. Baltimore (BWI) was selected, allowing Icelandair passengers to transit from its daily Boeing 737 MAX flight to an onward service offered by Southwest Airlines.

At the sidelines of Icelandair’s A321LR delivery on Tuesday, Simple Flying’s Dillon Shah had the opportunity to speak to the company’s Director for North America, Grimur Gislason about the new partnership.

The final piece of the puzzle

Icelandair’s existing partnerships in the United States include agreements with Alaska Airlines and JetBlue, signed in 2015 and 2011 respectively. They each cover different regions in the US, allowing Icelandair to leverage an expanded destinations list and efficient connections from its own flights to these areas.

“We have pretty much covered the West Coast with the Alaska Airlines partnership, and East Coast is JetBlue. We needed that Middle-South of America for which we didn’t have connections. Southwest was kind of that final piece of the puzzle that we needed to be able to do that.”

In September, Icelandair revealed that it had signed an agreement with Southwest Airlines, allowing customers “to easily connect between the two airlines’ networks.” This agreement marked the first of its kind for Southwest Airlines. In a press release at the time of the announcement, Ryan Green, Southwest Executive Vice President, Commercial Transformation said:

“Icelandair will become our initial partner through a shared focus on warm hospitality and value in air travel that both carriers strive to offer, enabling Southwest to further our global reach beyond the nearly 120 destinations we serve in North America. We’re grateful for the mutual confidence and enthusiasm that’s built a bridge between our two great airlines and aims to serve our customers and those of Icelandair on both sides of the Atlantic.”

Beyond Baltimore: Denver & Nashville

As mentioned, the first gateway will be Baltimore. Gislason elaborated:

“They need to see how it works and how it goes but they’re very excited about. They want to expand on their partnership. It goes without saying they want to put more codes on our flights and vice versa.”

Gislason is visibly excited about the new plan, but took caution with his words as to not jeopardise the agreement. He did reveal the following, however:

“It starts with Baltimore, but we do have big hubs in Denver and Nashville, which are pretty big hubs for Southwest too. Those are
definitely
the next steps.”

A refreshing absence of potentials or possibilities from Gislason, who is both straight-forward and careful not to share too much; Nashville and Denver are coming. It’s just a matter of time.