A passenger analyzes the airplanes at the Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport in Atlanta, Georgia, on July 2, 2025.
Charly triballeau | AFP | Getty images
Earning money in the summer is not as easy as it used to be for airlines.
The airlines have removed their schedules in August for a variety of reasons. Some travelers are choosing to fly before, in June or even in May, since schools left before what they used to do. The demand for flights to Europe has also moved from the suffocating summer and full of people to autumn, they have said that airline executives, especially for travelers with more flexibility, such as retirees.
Transporters still earn most of their money in the second and third quarter. But as travel demand has changed, and in some cases customers have become completely unpredictable, which makes the third quarter less a money manufacturer for airlines.
Change of plans, more expensive tickets
Airline planners have been forced to obtain more surgical with schedules in August as the demand for leisure is eliminated from spring and summer peaks. The labor and other costs have jumped after the pandemic, so it is essential to obtain the combination of flights correctly.
Transporters throughout the industry have been taking flight flights after a cantilever of too much capacity pushed by rates this summer. But capacity cuts are ready to further increase aerial rates, which increased 0.7% in July since last year, and a seasonally adjusted 4% from June to July, according to the latest reading of the United States inflation.
The internal capacity of US Airlines has dropped 6% in August since July, according to the Cirium aviation data firm. The same period last year, they reduced the domestic capacity of just over 4% compared to only a reduced size of 0.6% between the months in 2023, Cirium said. From July to August 2019, airlines reduced 1.7% of the capacity.
The operators who bet in an exuberant year were disappointed in early 2025 when consumers weighed again the rates of President Donald Trump, out again and the economic uncertainty. To attract more customers, many airlines reduced prices, even for flights on summer peaks at the end of June and July.
The demand has improved, said the airline executives in the profit calls in recent months, but airlines that include DeltaAmerican, United and Southwest Last month he lowered his 2025 earnings forecasts compared to his most sunny prospects at the beginning of the year.
More complicating things, some travelers have also been waiting until the last minute to book flights.
“It really was, I would say, in mid -May, when we began to see the reserves of the Fallen Day”, ” Jetblue Airways President Marty St. George told investors last month. “We had a fantastic day of the fallen, much better than what is forecast, and that really took June. But he has the feeling that people only waited a lot of time to make the final decisions.”
There is always next year
Now, some airlines are already thinking about how to approach the constantly changing travel patterns next year.
“The schools date back before and before, but what you also see is that schools come out before and before,” Brian Znotins, American Airlines'Vice president of planning and network schedule, he told CNBC.
Public schools in Dallas and Fort Worth, Texas, returned on August 5, and Atlanta public schools resumed on August 4. In 2023, more than half of the country's public school students returned to the classrooms in mid -August, according to the PEW Research Center.
Southwest, with its roots in Texas, ended its summer schedule on August 5 of this year, compared to August 15 in 2023. American, on the other hand, is changing a maximum flight next year.
“We are moving our entire summer schedule to the week before the day of the fallen,” Znotins said. “That is only in response to schools let themselves out in spring.” These plans include additions to a large number of long distance international flights.
“We are an airline throughout the year,” he continued. Znotins said the carrier not only has to make sure there are enough sedes for peak periods, but know when to reduce in lighter rooms, such as the first three months of the year.
“For a network planner, the most difficult schedules to build are those that there is a lower demand because it cannot count on the demand that reaches its flights,” said Znotins. “When the demand is less, you must find ways to attract customers to their flights with a good quality schedule and changes in the product.”
American said that his seat schedule in August was on par with July 2019, but that this year was 6% lower in August since July.
American prognosis last month could lose 10 cents adjusted to 60 cents per share in the third quarter, below what analysts expect. CEO Robert Isom said in a gain call that “Julio has been difficult,” although the carrier says that trends have improved.
Capacity cuts, together with more encouraging reserve patterns, are feeding optimism about a better balance of supply and demand in the coming weeks.
“The mistake that some airlines make, tends to try to build a church for Easter Sunday: builds its base base for those peak periods and then has too many [employees]”Said Raymond's airline analyst James Savanthi Syth.
She said it was unusual to see the airlines in all areas by rotting their summer schedules before the peak period ended, but she is optimistic about demand and rates, in the future.
“Time has passed and people are having a little more certainty about how their future looks and they are more willing to spend,” he said.
