Hawaiian Airlines CEO on Staying Small While Withstanding Competition
Photo Credit: Hawaiian Airlines CEO Peter Ingram took over in March. He will lead the carrier's strategy to compete with Southwest Airlines. Hawaiian Airlines / Marco Garcia
Skift Take
In the airline industry, bigger is almost always better. But Hawaiian Airlines is betting its unique niche will help it as more competitors add capacity in its markets. Still, the airline could someday be a takeover target for another airline that wants to grow.
To thrive as a full-service U.S. airline, a carrier must be all things to all people, taking customers everywhere they want to go, on their own aircraft or through partners, with enough frequency to satisfy business travelers.
At least that's conventional wisdom. It's espoused by big carriers, like United Airlines, as it adds capacity and grows its hubs, and smaller ones, such as Alaska Airlines, which acquired Virgin America so it could better fight for West Coast passengers. That was a blow to mid-sized JetBlue Airways, since it coveted Virgin America for the same reason.
But one U.S. airline doesn't seem interested in bulking up. It's Hawaiian Airlines, the niche Honolulu-based airline with robust service within Hawaii and a network that extends as far as Sydney, Beijing, Tokyo and New York. Analysts sometimes float Hawaiian as a merger partner for a larger carrier — perhaps Alaska or JetBlue — but the airline is content to remain small.
"Size isn't the only thing that
