Even though business travel may not be back at pre-coronavirus pandemic levels, Delta Air Lines is doing what it can to chase demand from road warriors.
The Atlanta-based airline filed plans over the weekend to launch two new routes to Northwest Arkansas National Airport (XNA) in Bentonville, Arkansas. The airline will add daily service to XNA from its hubs at Detroit Metropolitan Wayne County Airport (DTW) and Salt Lake City International Airport (SLC), as first seen in Cirium schedules and later confirmed by a carrier spokesperson.
The former will launch Nov. 11, 2024, while the latter will launch Feb. 13, 2025.
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Delta Connection affiliates Endeavor Air and SkyWest Airlines will operate the DTW and SLC routes, respectively. Endeavor will fly a 76-seat Bombardier CRJ-900, while SkyWest will deploy a 70-seat Embraer 175 regional jet on its SLC-XNA route.
Delta explained in a statement that it’s launching these routes to “bring more choice and more connectivity via our Detroit and Salt Lake City hubs for Delta customers traveling to and from this growing business market.”
Bentonville may not necessarily be on the radar for leisure travelers, but it’s a popular business destination largely frequented by consultants and other travelers supporting Walmart’s global headquarters operations, which are located there. XNA is also near the city of Fayetteville, home to the University of Arkansas — the flagship state university. Delta travelers based near DTW and SLC can now book convenient one-stop service via these hubs to get to Bentonville faster than before.
In addition to the new service, Delta serves Bentonville from hubs in Atlanta, Minneapolis-St. Paul and New York.
Interestingly, Delta’s two new routes are technically resumptions for the carrier, but they haven’t been operated in nearly a decade. Delta last flew from Detroit to Bentonville in June 2014, while it last flew from Salt Lake City to Bentonville in June 2015, Cirium schedules show.
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It’ll be interesting to see how Delta fares this time around, but the airline is seemingly hopeful.
On its recent second-quarter earnings call, president Glen Hauenstein shared that “we expect the strong growth in business travel to continue, with 90% of companies in our recent corporate survey saying they intend to maintain or increase travel volumes in the back half of the year.”
Business travel hasn’t recovered to pre-pandemic levels yet, and some airline analysts think that this new demand profile is structural and here to stay. For its part, Delta seems to be focused on chasing whatever pockets of demand it can find. After all, Delta considers itself “the business carrier of choice,” according to remarks from Hauenstein on the recent earnings call.
Delta’s Big Three competitors — American Airlines and United Airlines — also serve Bentonville with flights from a number of their hubs.
American is the largest carrier at XNA, with service from most of its hubs (Charlotte, Chicago, Dallas-Fort Worth, Los Angeles, Miami, Phoenix and Washington, D.C.).
Meanwhile, United serves the city from its Chicago, Denver and Houston hubs.
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