Originally Posted by
Husky One
Nobody said they would change their model to accommodate one route
The reality of the way VS operate is that they don’t know which aircraft will really be flying which route 6 months ahead never mind several years. They’ve even had to buy back an A340-600 recently to cover the mess made by the 787. The latter is also already too small for what they’re doing. If there are no A330’s serving MCO this year it’ll be the first year they’ve tried it. They’ve just chopped CUN which has better figures than BFS and 4 years is a long time to have a very large aircraft flying half empty for the majority of the summer season. I’d put a lot of money on next year’s program starting late and finishing early. With the fares they charge, a £28million loss points at a requirement for some fundamental changes. Delta passengers may like VS but Delta management will be breathing down their neck to make significant changes.
As I mentioned previously, VS had an 85% load factor on their BFS-MCO route in 2017. This is 7.2% higher than Virgin's June-July (i.e. the months BFS-MCO operated) average load factor of 77.8%. VS certainly aren't flying half empty B744s from Belfast.