WestJet of Canada and American Airlines have announced a codeshare deal where AA will put their flight numbers on up to 20 WestJet destinations in Canada not currently served by American Airlines.  This is in addition to WestJet’s brand new relationship with Delta which is an interline agreement.

WestJet was originally supposed to enter into a rather unique codeshare agreement with Southwest Airlines and Volaris (of Mexico) but chose to abandon the deal about 1 year ago when it decided that Southwest was taking too long to implement this and thought its fortunes were better served with another airline.

In many ways, WestJet is pursuing the Alaska Airlines model in being fairly agnostic as far as what airlines it will do a deal with.  The airline believes its future is better served with doing one-off deals with a variety of airlines rather than aligning itself with just one.   It isn’t an accident that WestJet’s CEO, Gregg Saretsky, is a former Alaska Airlines executive.

Curiously, WestJet is a Canadian low cost carrier that has based its operations on the 737-700 (with some -600 abnd -800 aircraft as well) and works much in the same model as Southwest.  It has two hubs, Toronto and Calgary, and pursues frequency on its trunk routes and serves a variety of small destinations throughout Canada as well.  They already fly to international destinations in the United States, the Caribbean and Mexico.  Also curious, this airline was founded with the help of David Neeleman while he waited out his non-compete clause with Southwest Airlines. 

WestJet has existing codeshare agreements with Cathay Pacific as well and interline agreements with British Airways, Air France, China Airlines and KLM. 

I can’t help but think that WestJet is the Canadian version of the airline that Southwest seeks to become and it would appear that WestJet is doing this with more agility and quicker execution than Southwest seems to be able to muster.

Filed under: Airline News by ajax