Southwest Airlines at Greenville/Spartanburg Intl. Airport

Southwest Airlines at Greenville-Spartanburg Intl. Airport
November 6, 2019
By: Michael Gutta

On November 3, 2019 Southwest Airlines resumed flights from Greenville-Spartanburg International Airport (GSP) to Baltimore-Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport, a service that was previously discontinued on April 12, 2016. The history of Southwest Airlines at GSP has been relatively short and has already seen highs and lows. Southwest service in South Carolina began on March 13, 2011 with flights from both GSP and Charleston International Airport (CHS). Service from GSP began with 7 daily departures to 5 destinations: Baltimore (BWI, 2x), Chicago-Midway (MDW, 2x), Nashville (BNA), Houston-Hobby (HOU), and Orlando (MCO). Southwest introducing service at GSP was a major boon for the airport and Upstate South Carolina region for reducing prices and keeping flyers from driving to Atlanta or Charlotte for lower fares.

Southwest B737-700 N931WN in Lone Star One livery at GSP on 6/4/2019 (Michael Gutta).

Southwest maintained the original 5 destinations out of GSP for over 2 years without any additions or subtractions until it was announced on June 7, 2013 that the flights to Orlando would end in August 2013 and the Baltimore frequency would be cut from 2x daily to 1x daily in October 2013. A further service cut was announced just six months later on December 19, 2013 when Southwest announced that service to Nashville would end on June 8, 2014. The major blow, and low point, of Southwest service came on October 28, 2015 when it was announced that starting on April 12, 2016 the only Southwest service at GSP would be a 3-times daily service to Atlanta. All service to other destinations would end on April 11, the previous day. For the last 3 years speculation has continued to rise on where GSP falls in Southwest’s plans. Finally, in May of 2019 Southwest announced that they would be resuming service from GSP to BWI on November 3, 2019.


So, getting beyond the history of Southwest service at GSP, let’s take a look back at the T-100 travel data for how Southwest service has performed. The full year data from 2011 to 2018 has been compiled in several forms for review, with 2011 being a partial year of data due to the service starting in March. In total, over 1.3 million passengers departed GSP on Southwest aircraft during the first 8 years of service, meaning the total arrivals and departures likely exceeded 2.6 million passengers. The peak number of seats available and departing passengers came in 2012 when nearly 240,000 passengers departed. In recent years with service only to Atlanta the annual departure count has hovered around 115,000 passengers.


Two other metrics used to review the data were daily departure count and the load factor, which tells on average how full the planes are. Just as shown on the timeline of service, the average daily departure count has decreased every single year since service began, however, 2019 will be the first-time service has increased year-over-year. The load factor has varied significantly over the years, with a low of 65.8% in 2013 and a high in 2014 of 77.5%. Load factor is affected by several influences, including pricing, but generally a load factor over 70% is required for any airline route to be successful. Four of the last five years have beaten this mark, with 2016 standing out as a low aberration of 67.4%. It is notable that for the last three and a half years Southwest has competed head-to-head with Delta Airlines on the flights to Atlanta. The resumption of flights to Baltimore will face no direct competition, though United Express serves Washington-Dulles (IAD) and American Eagle serves Washington-National (DCA).


Taking a closer look at the individual destinations Southwest has served from GSP perhaps introduces more questions than answers. Having said that, the first destination with cancelled service was Orlando (MCO) which at the time was the second-best performing destination, at least by load factor. Combined with the Orlando cut was a reduction in the BWI frequency, which made sense since it was the worst performing route with a load factor of 66.0%. The cut to Nashville service was also not surprising since it was the second-worst route with a load factor of 66.7%. The biggest surprise is that service was completely reconfigured by cutting all destinations in 2016 and only flying to Atlanta. The service to Houston-Hobby, in particular, appears to have been performing well, with an average load factor of 76.1% over 5 years. Another surprise is that with the latest announcement of expanded service, Baltimore (BWI) was chosen. Previously, BWI was the worst performing route, with service to Houston-Hobby and Chicago-Midway performing much better.


It is important to remember that many changes have taken place to Southwest’s network since service to GSP began, including most importantly, Southwest’s acquisition of Airtran which was finalized at the end of 2014. Southwest has changed which cities to focus on and even changed the network from a strict point-to-point network to a hybrid with hubs and connecting flights. The original 5 destinations from GSP reportedly only offered connections to a total of 68 destinations. Southwest at that time was still very much operating a point-to-point network. The current flight from GSP to Atlanta allows for connections onward to 36 destinations (GSP & BWI excluded from the destination list). The Baltimore (BWI) flight now offers substantially more connections on Southwest: 61 year-round destinations (GSP & ATL excluded) plus 4 seasonal destinations.

Southwest B737-700 N732SW on arrival to TPA on 12/8/2019 (Michael Gutta).

The success of Southwest’s recently launched flight from GSP to BWI may indicate if Southwest finds a niche or abandons the market in Greenville-Spartanburg. Prior to the resumption of service on November 3, GSP was 1 of only 4 cities in the Southwest network with annual service to a single destination. Furthermore, all 3 of the other cities have seasonal service to 1 or 2 other destinations.

Let me know your thoughts on this blog post and potential future topics involving the Greenville-Spartanburg International Airport, Southwest Airlines, or anything aviation related.

Data compiled for the report and figures above came from the USDOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics T100 Tables. A few other links to news stories are also shown below:

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