We have seen the importance of low cost carriers rise exponentially over the last few years. Of course, the prime example is Norwegian, which has done a fantastic job at shaking up the long haul transatlantic market from its various European hubs (London, Paris, Copenhagen).
In an effort to combat the increasing competition with LCC’s, legacy airlines have started to create brand new low cost subsidiary’s of their own. Lufthansa created Eurowing’s, a German short/long haul LCC. British Airways and Iberia (IAG) just created LEVEL this past year, which currently operates flights out of Barcelona to various destinations in North America, South America, and the Caribbean. Now a Skyteam airline is getting into the long haul LCC game.
Air France has created Joon, a low cost carrier geared towards millennials (18-35), and today the airline announced its first destinations.
Starting December 2017:
- Barcelona: 51 weekly flights
- Berlin: 37 weekly flights
- Lisbon: 28 weekly flights
- Porto: 3 weekly flights
Starting May, 2018:
- Fortaleza, Brazil: 2 weekly flights
- Mahe, Seychelles: 3 weekly flights
Aircraft:
Joon will lease some A320’s from its parent company Air France, as well as some A340-300’s. The airline has also stated that they plan on introducing some A350 aircraft in the future. It will be interesting to see if these aircraft will go directly to Joon, or be flown by Air France for a period and then transferred to its low cost subsidiary.
Onboard:
Joon will offer streaming entertainment to all customers in place of seat-back entertainment. This will help save the airline in extra fuel costs, as the technology required for seat back entertainment can add a lot of unnecessary weight to an aircraft. Passengers will also be able to charge up their entertainment devices with power ports, which will be available at every seat.
In a first of its kind move for an airline, Joon will also offer virtual reality headsets to business class customers. According to the airline:
This new generation headset provides several innovations such as a high-definition screen and a diopter correction to adapt to everyone’s eyes. It can be connected individually to each seat.
While the airline has not yet released the cabin layouts and seat designs, it may be giving customers a hint (or throwing us off the trail completely). Listed under “intercontinental flights” on Joon’s website, the airline displays the following photo.
Could this be a mockup of the airline’s proposed business class? If so, it looks remarkably similar to the old Air France business class, which is an angle-flat seat outfitted in a 2-3-2 layout on the airline’s wide body fleet.
Time will tell if this will actually be Joon’s premium class, or if the airline will implement an entirely new hard product. My guess is it will be something similar to the picture above, as it will allow passengers to have a (near) flat bad, while still giving the airline a higher density layout in a 2-3-2 configuration.
Unlike most low cost carriers, Joon will also offer passengers free “water, orange juice, organic Segafredo coffee, and tea.”
To the Point!
While I think the whole “millennial” theme is a bit played out and “try hard”, as a consumer, I am all for an additional low cost carrier. While the airline’s first two long haul destinations are to non North American cities, I am very excited to see where the airline chooses to fly in the United States. I may never step foot on a Joon aircraft, but I am definitely in favor of the airline continuing the trend of lowering transatlantic fares across the board. In the end, more competition means better fares for travelers.
What do you think of Air France’s new subsidiary Joon? Are they trying too hard with the whole “millennial” theme?
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