Exceptional ground staff at the check in at Kobe airport which went out of their way to help check in.

Disclosure: I almost always fly business class and am a bit of a snob about air travel, but I decided that for this short-haul flight I would give relatively low-cost Skymark a try. I was very happy with my choice. Everything from booking to seat selection to screening to boarding and inflight service worked very smoothly. The staff were extremely attentive and happy. The plane was a comfortable Boeing, such a nice change from the wretched regional jets prevalent on similar short-hop routes in the US and elsewhere. I was impressed by the calmly rational boarding process - first window seats, then middle seats, finally aisles - that worked efficiently. While in-flight service was expectedly limited, I was really blown away that one flight attendant stood at the head of the aisle for the entire two hour flight, entirely focused on scanning passengers to see if she could render assistance. Even on first class flights I’ve never seen such devotion to service. It’s a pity that much of Skymark’s business model could never be made to work outside Japan, reliant as it is on social norms in that country: in the US, staff would quit during the first day of training when they were told that they actually had to be nice to the customers.

I really love skymark as it has a good service with less price and they also allow 20 kg of Cabin luggage. The flight was in time and the staffs are very friendly.

Shopping carefully allows flying Skymark to Haneda rather than one of the LCC fares plus baggage charges to Narita. My latest flight was comfortable and on time.

From my feeling, it is NOT a LCC nor FSC (Full Service Carrier), it is between them. The airfare is NOT so cheap, and the services are OK ( but you have to buy ). At HANEDA, they use bus from terminal to planes, instead of using boarding bridge. It is sometimes troublesome if it is rain. At Nagasaki airport , they use same boarding bridge as FSC uses. The problem is that they stop at KOBE on the way of the flight since KOBE is their HUB airport. Overall it is OK because regular airfare is cheaper than FSC regular airfare, but comparing FSC's discount airfare, they are similar price.