One city that has received outsized attention from American Airlines in 2021 is Austin. The capital of Texas and one of the fastest-growing metro areas in the United States, the city is becoming a hub for business, education, and culture. While much of American’s growth is concentrated around its hubs, Austin is a bit of an outlier, given that the airline serves numerous destinations nonstop from the city. Speaking on an exclusive webinar interview with Simple Flying, Vasu Raja, Chief Revenue Officer of American Airlines, discussed the airline’s presence in the city.

Austin is a unique point for American Airlines

Austin has seen growth unlike any other non-hub city in American’s network. One of the primary reasons American can grow out of the city is because of its customer base, as Mr. Raja explained:

“The very obvious thing is that Austin is a massive customer base for us…Our level of AAdvantage penetration in Austin is is pretty eye-popping really. And what we found through these partnerships is it’s such a massive and growing local market, that there’s a lot of opportunity to be able to serve our customer base.”

Short of Southwest, American Airlines has the largest market share of any of the big three US airlines when it comes to the city. While there were times when Delta and United had been biting on American’s heels in Austin, American has essentially started blowing those two out of the water with new routes this year.

American Airlines launches new routes

Growth in Austin first started in earnest in March. While the airline had some action pre-crisis on routes, the carrier came in with ten new routes from Austin-Bergstrom International Airport (AUS) to some top business and leisure destinations, including Orlando, Las Vegas, Nashville, Raleigh, and Washington D.C., among others.

Then, in June, American announced a second expansion out of Austin with 14 new destinations. This mainly included secondary cities in the United States like Kansas City, Indianapolis, Reno, and Tulsa. Abroad, American added flights to Mexico, Costa Rica, and the Caribbean. Since then, American has also quietly added some new destinations from Austin, like Denver.

Come December, American expects its Austin route network to look like this:

American Airlines’ anticipated route map in Austin this December. Photo: Cirium
 

Partners have also been key for American in Austin

Something that may be overlooked is that American Airlines is receiving support from its partners in Austin, especially Alaska Airlines. As Mr. Raja explained, this created some of the impetus for American to look at adding new flying on its own metal:

“We’ve been pleasantly surprised that [Alaska] has been hugely beneficial for us in places like Austin. In Austin, where we have a massive customer base, but we’ve never been able to take them to the West Coast. Now, they can get there on all of those Alaska Airlines services. And, indeed, through that, it kind of got us thinking that actually we need to go fly more nonstop services out of Austin as well.”

Looking at American’s route network, save for Reno and Los Angeles, American Airlines does not give customers in Austin nonstop access to the West Coast, including in lucrative business markets like Seattle and San Francisco. Throw Alaska’s routes into the mix, and this is what American can market to its customers in the United States:

Alaska and American’s routes out of Austin. Photo: Cirium
 

Alaska adds Seattle, Portland, San Francisco, San Jose, San Diego, and Boise to destinations out of Austin. Another route that Alaska thinks will be one of its most interesting is a flight between Austin and Palm Springs, which will be a kind of test for the Alaska-American partnership.

Through British Airways, American can also market transatlantic service. British Airways is coming back to Austin on October 13th with nonstop flights to London-Heathrow (LHR). With a single stop in London, customers can make it to destinations in Africa, the Middle East, Asia, and Europe from Austin.