JetBlue raised bag fees again. Third time in a year. The airline is now less a carrier than a storage unit with wings.
Fuel costs are climbing. JetBlue's answer is to charge you for the suitcase. Not the fuel. The suitcase. The jet fuel stays on the plane, which is the part that costs money. Your socks are the problem.
Consider the math. A pair of socks weighs almost nothing. JetBlue has decided the socks are the reason oil is expensive. Brilliant. Nobody has ever been wrong about oil while holding a mid-size rolling bag.
Retail traders will see this and buy JetBlue calls. They always do. They see a fee hike and call it "pricing power." They see a stock chart shaped like a ski slope and call it "consolidation." Their portfolios are carry-ons that never made it past the gate agent.
The chart doesn't care about bag fees. The chart doesn't care about you. The chart has never checked a bag in its life, which makes it the only one here with a clean record.
Fee number three arrives like fee number two, which arrived like fee number one. Same airline. Same suitcase. Same shrug. At this pace, fee number four will be a charge for the overhead bin's feelings.
Pack light. Or pay JetBlue to watch your dignity travel in the cargo hold, where it belongs.
Photo by Samuel Isaacs on Unsplash
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