EVERETT — Frontier Airlines will begin service from Paine Field in June, giving the Everett airport a second carrier besides Alaska Airlines.
Service to Denver, Las Vegas and Phoenix will start on June 2. Officials made the announcement during a press conference Tuesday at Paine Field.
“We believe there is a strong unmet demand for low fares in this region, and to be honest, for most people in this area, Paine Field is the most convenient choice,” said Stephen Shaw, senior manager of network planning for the airline, at the press conference.
The new Monday, Wednesday, Friday service will add 18 new departures and arrivals a week at Paine Field. Alaska already offers flights to Las Vegas and Phoenix.
Currently, Alaska Airlines has between 10 and 14 departures daily, depending on the day of the week.
Frontier said it will initially offer discount fares of $39 one way to Denver and $29 to Las Vegas and Phoenix.
Frontier is known as an ultra-budget carrier, meaning it charges extra for amenities other airlines offer for no cost, raising the total fare. The airline charges for advance seat selection, putting luggage in an overhead compartment, and snacks aboard its planes.
Shaw said Frontier choose Paine after determining that there is unmet passenger demand for the new routes, and saw an opportunity to beat Alaska Airlines on ticket prices on its existing Phoenix and Las Vegas routes.
Alaska Airlines did not respond to requests for comment.
The new service is a boost for Paine Field and its operator, Propeller Airports, which had been struggling to rebuild service back to its pre-COVID-19 levels.
“We are getting back to where we started,” Propeller CEO Brett Smith said Tuesday.
Alaska Airlines offered 18 departures each day when the airport first opened for passenger service in March 2019, and United Airlines added another six daily departures several months later. More than 1 million passengers used the terminal in its first year of operation.
Not only did passenger numbers exceed expectations, but Smith said Propeller was planning for a terminal expansion that would have added another four to six gates to the existing three.
The airport never returned to pre-pandemic levels of passenger traffic.
Alaska reduced its schedule, and United stopped flights to San Francisco in 2020 and Denver in October 2021.
Last year, the terminal saw 580,000 passengers depart or arrive on planes, Propeller statistics show.
Propeller has been trying to attract additional carriers to fill the gap in flights that has plagued the airport the several years. The Frontier service to Denver will be the first to that city for Paine Field since United left.
“We have been talking to all the airlines,” Smith said of efforts to convince more airlines to fly from Paine.
He said the deal with Frontier came quickly after several months of negotiations.
While Paine Field has struggled, Seattle-Tacoma International Airport, the region’s largest airport, beat pre-pandemic passenger numbers in 2024.
The airport saw 52.6 million passengers in 2024, beating 2019’s record of 51.8 million. The airport has proposed more than two dozen expansion projects, including a new terminal, to meet continuing demand.
Smith said Paine Field is the logical alternative to a crowded SeaTac.
Smith said flights to and from Paine have had a high number of seats filled and passenger demand is there. He said the airport had reduced passenger numbers because the flights aren’t there.
Alaska uses a combination of Boeing 737 planes, as well as smaller regional jets manufactured by Embracer, and flown under its Horizon subsidiary name, at Paine Field.
Smith said he hoped the Frontier service would be a catalyst for other airlines to use Paine Field. He said an expansion of the terminal is still possible if travelers come back in larger numbers.
The terminal at Paine Field is a rarity in the world of commercial airports in the United States. While Paine Field is run by Snohomish County, the airport terminal is privately financed and run by Propeller Airports in conjunction with financial giant BlackRock.
Part of the success of that effort to bring more passengers to Paine may depend on convincing more travelers to use Frontier.
Frontier Airlines’s low fare pitch has made the airline almost fully dependent on cost-cutting leisure travelers.
Even those travelers have long complained about cramped seats in consumer surveys.
Frontier officials addressed some of those issues at Tuesday’s press conference, stating that the airline had introduced “sweeping changes” to its seating choices and its customer service, including the start of first-class service in late 2025.
Airline officials said Frontier now offers “Upfront Plus” in the first two rows of each plane with extra legroom and no middle seat.
Randy Diamond: 425-339-3097; randy.diamond@heraldnet.com
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