It was an interesting statement to make that the airline "suspended commercial flights in response to the financial crisis" Really???
What a convenient, one size fits all excuse for the company having lousey management.
No disrespect to the current CEO, it was not a mess of his making but the company has been poorly run from day one. Countless CEO's have come and gone and for various reasons, none have been able to make it work.
I notice the distinct abscence of Potty's name or his dubious credentials. Perhaps he has fallen out of favour with the Sheikhs for wasting so much of their money. The airline was apparently started to support Ras Al Khaimah's economic developement but that is not what seems to be happening.
It's promising at least that while this ACMI is ongoing, someone else is paying the bills and mitigating the losses somewhat. If they can take on more aircraft it might be a business worth looking at going forward. Plenty of aircraft out there at good rates and plenty of opportunity for this type of ops as many airlines dash to reduce operating costs, reduce fleets sizes and put growth on hold. ACMI allows the flexibility to call in support for the peak period and for someone like Rak Airways it would shield them from the main variable cost; the fuel. Pure ACMI requires far less staff too.
But what's the alternative? Look at the options... A loco? Unlikely, there is already one, a good one with a great business model and reputation, right on their doorstep. And another one coming this summer. The surrounding catchment area is too sparse to support a Rak based loco.
Charter? Maybe... but Rak, as a place, is a little too quiet to become a mass tourist attraction, there isn't really anything to do there. Apart from the luxury hotels there needs to be more on offer. Some hard pitching and creative marketing would be required to entice travel agents enough to bite and do it regularily. The financial crisis would have a negative impact on this strategy so some very competetive pricing would be required. It might be possible if the hotels were struggling, to hammer them down and come up with a good package of flights and accomm. The Ryanair marketing strategy could be used by selling RAK as Dubai but again, the prices would have to be good enough to offset the bother of being at least 1hr drive from Dubai, it might work if given some time and good marketing.
A scheduled, full service, 2 class? Unlikely that this would work. Most savvy business class pax would go for EK. Either that or the pricing would have to be very keen to attract them. Some extra services to get people to Dubai such as limos or busses would be needed as RAK airport is a very unattractive location. Even if you went all 'Y' class, where is the market? what routes would be flown? You would have to have a longer reach than Air Arabia so as not to compete with them.
Regardless, you cannot make money as an airline with one aircraft.
It's going to be interesting to see how this pans out...
Good luck to the new CEO.
Hustle On
