HH/HI
The SOU/BOH move by Flybe will be based on facts. The airline has ten years of passenger data operating from the south coast, they know who flies, where they live, which routes they use and often, whether or not they are on business or leisure. The airline management are professional and have sophisticated analysis tools at their disposal. The airline like any business has to grow, this is one string to that bow.
The reality is that many of the SOU passengers originate west and south of the city, basically Dorset, further from LHR and LGW than SOU, they have longer travel times and less propensity to hack up to the London airports for a cheaper fare or better schedule.
Running these new routes in parallel is not so different from the CWL/BRS example of KLM. This latest south coast move importantly gets Flybe further away from the LHR/LGW competition which is the Southampton Achilles heel, the move also leverages routes that have a history of decent numbers from BOH, at least for Paris, Amsterdam, Dublin and Glasgow, even Manchester (if you know the full history MAN was run twice daily with a 48 seat aircraft for years) these routes have legs and with good scheduling, the airports and routes should complement one another, just as the London airports do for countless routes every day... and if you check the CAA stats these are cities that clearly have growth potential based on recent performance.
The French routes from BOH seem odd, as I said back in June, but again Flybe have the buying history of the passengers in the region for ten years, they will know the prospects much better than most Pruners. And if Ryanair can make Carcassonne work year in year out from Bournemouth with a 189 seat 737, what do I know!
... and oh yes, if the Flybe CEO is worth his salt, he will have remembered from his past role, what the EZY analysis said for all these new city pairs.
FF
Last edited by Flitefone; 13th Nov 2014 at 21:47.