Sun Country sees travel demand surge as omicron recedes

Travel demand rising above pre-pandemic levels is giving Sun Country Airlines a lift in its all-important first quarter, the company's chief financial officer told investors Thursday.

"Beginning in mid-January or so, we saw a real rebound from sort of an omicron low, which we'd been experiencing for three or four weeks," Sun Country's Dave Davis said at the Barclays Industrial Select Conference in Miami on Thursday morning.

"Since then it's been really, really strong. I mean, double digits versus 2019, 2020, 2021," he said.

Shares of Sun Country rose 3% Thursday, a day when broad market indexes swung sharply in reaction to Russia's attack on Ukraine.

Sun Country is the No. 2 carrier at Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport, behind Atlanta-based Delta Air Lines, the dominant carrier in the Twin Cities.

Twin Cities-based Sun Country focuses on leisure passengers and counts on a strong first quarter as Midwest travelers seek getaways.

Sun Country is preparing for growth this year by adding eight planes to its fleet of 48, then six to seven annually in future years, Davis told conference attendees. Applications for pilots are up 160%, after the carrier came to an agreement with pilots that included competitive industry wages, he said.

Travel's recovery hit some bumps in the fourth quarter. The omicron variant caused a surge in COVID-19 cases across the country dampening demand. A spate of holiday flight cancellations resulted because of weather and staff shortages.

In the last week of the year, a problem with a key computer system led Sun Country to cancel about 15% of flights on two consecutive days. That disruption produced delays for most of the week leading into New Year's weekend. Sun Country paid out about $1 million to passengers in vouchers and other expenses as a result of the disruptions, executives have said.