Virgin America To Service Fort Lauderdale in November

August 11, 2009 at 7:28 AM | by JetSetCD | Comments (3)

Who's ready for spring break?!?!!? Okay okay calm down, because you've still got another eight or so months before you can decamp with your whole camp down to Florida's beaches for barely legal fun. But for you snow birds and West Coasters looking to trade the clubs of LA for the clubs of Miami, the partying will start in November as Virgin America has today announced that they'll be flying nonstop from San Francisco and Los Angeles to sunny Fort Lauderdale.

Tickets went on sale today for flights beginning November 18, and with two direct roundtrips daily from each city, including the only directs between FLL and SFO, we expect them to go like hotcakes. True to their LCC nature—who thinks of them a low-cost carrier anymore, with their WiFi and great service?—the tickets will start out rather cheap. We're talking prices from $99 each way for economy and $499 and up for higher classes (those with the white leather massage chairs).

Since Fort Lauderdale is the tenth destination for the barely two year-old carrier based in California, we just had to ask CEO David Cush his thoughts. We chatted with him this morning on the phone, and aside from talking about further expansion—which we'll detail in a later post today—David said that although Virgin America is "typically thought of as a leisure carrier," they are looking to nail down more corporate destinations; this addition of FLL concludes Virgin's focus on sexy cities.

So who'll be flying this route, you ask? Well, we're thinking about all those football fans for Superbowl 2010, the LA artists who flock to Miami's Art Basel, the SF web entrepreneurs and bloggers who can't bear to be without internet during a flight anymore, and even people in South Florida heading west to visit relatives. Let's not forget the cruisers either; Fort Lauderdale and Miami are key ports for the mega cruise ships and these routes easily connect with VA's other flights from Las Vegas, Seattle, Orange County and San Diego.

My my how you've grown, Virgin America. We remember when you were still taking your first steps out of SFO to JFK and now you're growing into your party pants almost two years to the day that we first speculated on you adding Miami as a destination. We're so proud; we're toasting an imaginary absinthe cocktail to you today.

Related Stories:
· Virgin America Coverage [Jaunted]

[Plane photo: Virgin America; Miami beach photo: matt.hintsa; master photoshop work: Jaunted]

Comments (3)

Return to » Virgin America To Service Fort Lauderdale in November

I could not be any happier with this announcement. This is fabulous news. I can't wait to fly VA again for my two Caribbean cruises next year! Well done Virgin America!!

Too bad both Virgin America and JetBlue chose FLL, where you need a car or taxi to go anywhere -- I would have preferred to see one of them choose MIA. I guess that FLL made them landing fee and gate offers that they couldn't refuse.

Except even at MIA you need a car, you could get to the train if you catch one of the buses but even after getting on that wherever you go you have to deal with getting a cab to get into the city. At least in FLL it's a lot easier to get around inside the airport and things aren't laid out in such a crazy manner.

Jaunted

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