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Last week JetBlue extended its schedule listing through the first week of September 2017 and Routesonline picked up on an interesting update that should please a lot of transcon travelers – it looks like JetBlue plans to offer its MINT service between New York and San Diego from August 2017.
On top of that, JetBlue has announced that it will commence MINT service between Ft. Lauderdale and Long Beach from May 2017.
MINT is JetBlue’s First Class cabin and has only been around since 2014. The cabin was originally only available on the airline’s ultra-premium routes (like JFK-LAX) but, since 2015, the MINT experience has been spreading.
In November 2015 JetBlue began offering MINT on some of its Caribbean routes, in March 2016 MINT was introduced on to transcon flights from Boston and, in April this year, the airline announced a significant expansion of the product to a further 7 routes.
Two of those routes were New York – San Diego and Ft. Lauderdale – Long Beach…..and it looks as if JetBlue is making good on that expansion plan.
New York – San Diego
While nothing is currently set in stone (you can’t currently book JetBlue flights past the middle of June) JetBlue has tentatively scheduled a MINT configured Airbus A321 to fly between New York JFK and San Diego on one of its two daily flights between the cities.
From 15 August 2017 the planned schedule looks like this:
B6189 JFK 09:00 – 11:57 SAN (Daily) – MINT configured flight
B6089 JFK 15:59 – 19:01 SAN (Mon-Fri & Sun)
B6089 JFK 16:00 – 19:02 SAN (Sat)
B6190 SAN 13:10 – 21:41 JFK (Daily) – MINT configured flight
B6090 SAN 20:40 – 05:01+1 day JFK (Daily)
Ft. Lauderdale – Long Beach
From 3 May 2017 the schedule looks like this:
B6943 FLL 17:51 – 20:28 LGB (Daily)
B6944 LGB 121:24 – 05:25+1 day FLL (Daily)
JetBlue MINT
JetBlue’s MINT configured A321 aircraft offer 5 rows of premium seating in a staggered formation:
And that gives passengers the choice of sitting in two seats next to each other (great for couples)…..
JetBlue MINT Cabin
…on in a central “throne” seat which is great for solo travelers:
JetBlue MINT Cabin
But most importantly the seats lie-flat so passengers in the cabin have a chance of a comfortable sleep during the flight:
JetBlue MINT Cabin
I confess to not having had the chance to try out JetBlue’s premium product but I can honestly say I’ve never heard a bad word said against it. Passengers seem to love it and the fact that it’s often available for $599 one-way across the US has made it extremely popular.
But it’s not just the nice seats and cabin that has passengers so enthralled by MINT – it’s the whole product.
MINT isn’t just a domestic First Class cabin, it’s a set of offerings bundled up and presented as one premium product:
Sure, you could argue that the legacy airlines offer a packaged up domestic premium product too…but JetBlue seems to have got something right that the 3 big carriers are still working on – service.
Whenever someone talks to me about MINT the first thing they seem to mention is the “great service” they received…and then they go on to talk about things like the seats and cabin. Service seems to be a big part of JetBlue’s premium offering and that’s not all that common nowadays.
It’s little touches that help make all the difference, like friendly flight attendants, free inflight wi-fi, priority baggage that does actually come out before other bags and some particularly good food choices.
Bottom Line
MINT raised the bar and lowered the prices for premium transcon travel so seeing it expanded to more and more routes is excellent news for travelers…especially travelers like me.
The product is already available on a lot of routes I’m likely to fly (West Coast – East Coast) and now it looks as if JetBlue has added two more. Great!
I recently wrote that I don’t expect to be aiming for top-tier airline status in 2018 (with any airline) and that will make me a free agent. Free agency means that I’ll get to fly with whatever airline I want to fly without having to worry about how it will affect my chances of requalifying for top-tier status ..and I genuinely can’t wait for that. JetBlue MINT here I come 🙂
