UPDATE: May 11, 9 AM ET
As of Monday morning, May 11, the new audit listed on the website shows the total pledged has reached $337 million.
The website states they are currently in progress on creating legal structures before they can officially begin fundraising and taking money.
UPDATE: May 5, 11 AM ET
As of Tuesday morning, the total pledged has reached $132 million.
Original text:
There’s no question that bygone budget carrier Spirit Airlines had its die-hard fans. The airline’s rock-bottom, no-frills fares were beloved by millions of cost-conscious travelers across the United States.
Now, those fans are trying to relaunch the defunct airline, which officially announced its closure on Saturday, May 2.
A crowdfunding effort to save the low-cost carrier and launch “Spirit 2.0” is sweeping social media—and raising tens of millions of dollars so far.
The idea was started by Instagram user Hunter Peterson, a Spirit Airlines enthusiast who in 2025 documented his journey to fly aboard the carrier for 24 hours straight. In a video on social media, Peterson proposes that travelers band together to purchase the airline and nationalize it in order to have a carrier that is run by the people.
In the initial video, Peterson notes that if just 20% of U.S. adults pledged a small amount, it would be possible to purchase Spirit’s remaining assets and potentially relaunch the carrier. To accept pledges from travelers, Peterson launched the crowdfunding site LetsBuySpiritAir.com.
“The passengers, the workers, and the communities Spirit served can take it back,” the site’s landing page says. Spirit’s closure has left an estimated 17,000 airline employees without jobs.
The idea appears to be catching on: the crowdfunding site says it has raised more than $88 million in pledges so far, and the overwhelming response from travelers crashed its servers. A disclaimer on the site said on Monday that servers should be up and running again in the next 24-48 hours.
Currently, the crowdfunding effort’s minimum pledge is set at $45, which according to the site was the cost of the average Spirit Airlines ticket.
In an industry currently seeing elevated fares and higher fees, the concept of an affordable airline run by the public has clearly resonated with travelers.
“Spirit didn't fail because people stopped flying,” the crowdfunding site states. “It failed because Wall Street loaded it with debt and extracted every dollar it could. The routes are real. The demand is real. The only thing missing is ownership that answers to the people — not to shareholders.”
In recent years, budget carriers have struggled to maintain profitability as demand for premium products has soared. The financial strain among affordable airlines have left them open to being targeted by private equity groups, who swoop in to streamline operations and squeeze out more profit.
Southwest Airlines is another example that has left loyal passengers embittered, as a private equity firm took a majority stake in the carrier and nixed some of the most beloved services, like open seating and free checked bags, in order to increase profits.
In the case of Spirit, loyal budget fliers are putting their money where their mouth is: according to the Spirit 2.0 site’s metrics, there has so far been a total of 124,755 funding patrons who have pledged an average of $667 per person, and counting.
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