Originally Posted by
shamrock7seal
If I was easyJet I would want to defend my LGW operation and consolidate there. SOU is a costly airport to operate from (having no other sources of commercial revenue) BUT easyJet Holidays do seem to compete well with Jet2 Holidays at other bases. Look at BRS for example.
Jet2 does not operate from LGW so easyJet has a strategic advantage there. Is there any advantage to easyJet purposely loosing £m's by basing aircraft at SOU in order to defend LGW? Crazier things have been done so perhaps one should never say never.
Replicating what they do at SEN at SOU? They operate from SEN because they do not serve STN in any significant way, so we can't really draw comparisons there.
EasyJet are operating leisure oriented routes out of SEN because they can no longer compete with the frequency offered at STN, and SEN is seen as a differentiator in that market. Their retrenching against Ryanair as a low-cost competitor made their STN base stagnant for years before closing it during Covid. Now EZY have gone down the package holiday avenue, where Ryanair is less of a threat, and left a void that allowed Jet2 to expand there on a huge scale.
They chose to consolidate at LTN/LGW only to prove they then couldn't cope with the LGW operation last summer, neither can they hold on to the LGW slots they leased, so are now forced to cut their market share in London whilst competitors are growing. EZY will need to find a way to address that and find a way to differentiate. SEN or SOU are both viable candidates for that - They could both act essentially as a London overspill.