Alaska AirlinesAre turning two of their mid-life years BoeingThe 737-800s are being converted into cargo planes. This bet is that air freight’s pandemic boom will continue to bring in revenue, even after passengers return to travel.

This fifth-largest airline in the United States, based out of Seattle, has three Boeing 737 700s that are dedicated to freight only. Although it is small for an airline with 217 mainline aircraft, at the end 2021 the number was still impressive. But the pandemic made cargo even more valuable.

Covid forced airlines to reduce flights. This resulted in a reduction of belly space for passengers on planes all over the globe that normally carried everything, including live animals and packages as well as pharmaceuticals. That drove up demand — and prices — for air cargo.

Alaska issued a request to suppliers to transform the planes into air cargo, but has not yet found a supplier. Although the increase could be greater than what is currently available, Alaska has not yet made a commitment to add more.

CNBC spoke with Adam Drouhard (the airline’s managing Director of Cargo), who said that “I don’t think the magic amount is two.”

These new aircraft will serve Alaskan destinations.

Some companies include Boeing have been adding capacity to convert more passenger jets to cargo planes to capitalize on the trend.

Stephen Fortune, Cargo analyst, stated that the cost of turning a passenger aircraft into a freighter involves the removal of passenger seats, overhead bins, strengthening the plane’s floor and cutting a cargo doors for easy loading.

Alaska introduced 737-700 conversions in 2017 but Drouhard indicated that it will not be as difficult to expand the fleet beyond those two planes.

He said, “It won’t be as big a ramp-up with one every 8-10 years.”

IBA Insight reports that 101 passenger planes became freighters by 2021. That’s an increase from the 59 and 71 respectively in 2019.

The majority of U.S. passenger airline companies don’t have separate freighter aircraft, but they did benefit from increased cargo demand in the wake of the pandemic. Some airlines flew passenger aircraft with empty seats and full cargo belly when there was a drop in travel demand.

Cargo revenue for United AirlinesThe U.S. carrier that does long-haul international flights, UAL, earned $2.35B last year. This is more than 42% higher than 2020, and nearly double the amount of 2019, prior to Covid. The airline’s air freight segment accounted for almost 10% of the company’s total sales, up from 3% in 2019.

Airline that is low-cost, but also offers a great service for leisure travelers Sun CountryStart flying cargo AmazonIn 2020, on freighters to the air unit of the e-commerce giant. This plan was drawn up in 2019, but was accelerated during the pandemic.