This weekend we took a look under Virgin America's web hood and found out that this Virgin, while competitive on price, isn't going to be offering rock bottom prices out of the gate on August 8th.
Roundtrip flights from New York to Los Angeles ring in between $377 and $438. Sure it's a good deal, but the even better news is Southwest and JetBlue have already announced they will be matching Virgin prices.
So what is the Virgin game plan? Well, we have been inside their cabin and we can tell you it is easily the best cabin on a US carrier, bar none.
However, one way the Virgin can make a great first impression on those first to ride her is to be on time. Now, we know some luck has to factor into this, but with fewer flights and fewer destinations, if Virgin can be reliably on time, say from LAX to SFO, a route that is currently known as a faster drive than a flight, the word will get out. LAX to SFO is an easy to digest $50 each way, thus with a decent on time arrival rate, fliers could flock to VA. After all, no one wants to be on the Grapevine, but United makes avoiding that long, boring drive nearly impossible.