So many of us choose to fly when we go to Disney World, which generally means flying into Orlando International Airport.
Orlando Airport
Most of us are also pretty dutiful in checking airfare prices, looking for deals, and scoring the best prices we can for those flights. That’s where the budget airlines come in. But recently, we’ve noticed a troubling trend. Some budget airlines are cutting routes to Orlando International Airport (MCO). So we have to ask — is this going to continue, and should we be concerned?
Let’s take a look at airlines that have cut flights from Orlando. Recently, Spirit Airlines cut all its routes from Raleigh-Durhan International Airport (RDU) to MCO. The route had 53 routes in April 2023, but by November, it had been narrowed down to just 14. It’s likely that there just weren’t enough flyers from RDU to MCO to keep the routes going, especially after the airline is struggling due to a failed merger with JetBlue.
Spirit Airlines at Orlando Airport
Avelo Airlines also pulled its flights to Orlando from Raleigh-Durham International Airport, according to CBS 17. An Avelo Airlines spokeswoman said, “For these routes, there is a lot of demand from multiple carriers from RDU and our planes are better used on other RDU routes.”
©Orlando International Airport
Frontier Airlines is ending flights from Harrisburg International Airport in Pennsylvania to Orlando. The airline is expected to end flights to Orlando from seven other cities later in 2024. This move is likely due to a “network strategy shift.”
Frontier Plane at the Orlando Airport
One airline, Canada’s Lynx Airlines, recently stopped flying EVERYWHERE, including Orlando. The company had previously shown significant growth, but after exploring cost reductions and efforts to be sold or merged, its financial issues had become “too significant to overcome.”
©Lynx Air
So what’s going on? Well, with the case of Raleigh-Durham International Airport, it sounds like the competition is just too stiff, and people are choosing other airlines or other ways to get to Orlando. However, it also seems like the budget airlines are struggling financially. Spirit was blindsided when its merger with JetBlue was blocked. Frontier seems to be focusing its efforts on specific markets rather than spreading itself too thin.
Orlando International Airport
So, do we need to worry about flights to Orlando? Well, it could be harder to get a flight on a budget airline to Orlando, but the larger airlines continue to fly into and out of Orlando every day.
Orlando International Airport
Some also fear this could keep airfare prices higher, as there will be less competition for flights into and out of Orlando. We’ll have to wait and see how these flight cuts affect things at Orlando International Airport.
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Tough ouch for Raleigh/Duram flights, but I fly from Hartford CT and have seen Spirit almost disappear over the past 6 months. Where are the planes going. I used to fly Spirit to Orlando, but now there are days when there are zero flight, multiple days with no flights from Spirit at all to MCO. What happened…
Orlando is my home airport, and I fly Delta exclusively, so it’s good news to me. Les’s travelers, Les’s planes, Les’s busy!
The news (and apparently the Fed) is full of optimism and convinced that consumers are confident, and inflation and recession fears are over. Okay, maybe that’s not true for every voice out there, but there seems to be a lot of disconnect from reality out there to me. Most people I know are still well in financial shock over the cost of everything going up 30-300% in just a few years. Many people who thought they would get tax refunds are getting big tax bills. For well over 90% of people, vacations, and flying on them, are luxuries that have to be saved up for and/or use up credit lines (or they would use tax refunds that they’re not getting now). Business travel budgets are way down too, with most organizations just trying to get people into their local offices instead of working from home. And, with Disney doing more and more to cater only to people who can afford the most expensive experiences, it’s no wonder the bargain hunter market for flying to Orlando is dwindling. It’s so sad. We’re addicted to having our car, and we tend to indulge a lot in souvenirs, so we drive, but this isn’t a good direction for anyone.