SOUTHEND 5
Stobart Air S15 Schedules On Sale
The Stobart Air operation under Flybe branding is much reduced for S15, which is on sale this morning.
Just one aircraft will be used and FMO, GRQ and RNS will be served once daily, while CFR is 4 x weekly increasing to 6 x weekly in July and August. There is no Stobart Air presence on the DUB route with Flybe operating that route daily.
Quite a retrenchment.
Just one aircraft will be used and FMO, GRQ and RNS will be served once daily, while CFR is 4 x weekly increasing to 6 x weekly in July and August. There is no Stobart Air presence on the DUB route with Flybe operating that route daily.
Quite a retrenchment.
Join Date: Jul 2002
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Better to have one aircraft making hopeful a profit than two making a combined loss. It was always going to be a tough start but at least they are hanging in there so maybe some expansion in the future.
So looking at 2015 do we expect passenger figures to go up or down? I am thinking that maybe Southend will drop just below 1 million.
So looking at 2015 do we expect passenger figures to go up or down? I am thinking that maybe Southend will drop just below 1 million.
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And a Merry Christmas to you, too. I would really like to see the Stobart operation have a go at taking a very small share of a very thick route and see whether it works. If you look at what CityFlyer did at LGW, as well as operating some "regional" routes e.g. Rotterdam, it did very well by taking very small shares of thick London routes - Amsterdam and Brussels for example. AMS is obviously already operated from SEN but there are others that could be tried. I never like to say "told you so" but on a previous SEN thread I predicted that ANR would never work from SEN. One of the many clues to this was that CityFlyer couldn't make it work from LGW and it was one of the few routes they gave up on.
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It could be Stobart's fault, but it may well be down to the radio station, continuing with the advert beyond the time that Stobart had paid for. If so, it's a sign that the radio station hasn't attracted enough advertising and so they keep running adverts in order to sound as if they have. Obviously they don't listen to them.
I once paid for a month's advertising on a fleet of buses and they were still there ten months later! Darn good value, but the event I was advertising had taken place eight months earlier.......
I once paid for a month's advertising on a fleet of buses and they were still there ten months later! Darn good value, but the event I was advertising had taken place eight months earlier.......
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Have Stobart lost interest in SEN, I wonder? Their efforts seem to have peaked around spring 2014 and since then they don't seem to have covered themselves with glory in their efforts to promote the airport and its services.
Why allow the Dublin route to die (which is what will happen with the current reduction to a once a day service)? It was a success with Aer Lingus....
Why allow the Dublin route to die (which is what will happen with the current reduction to a once a day service)? It was a success with Aer Lingus....
It was a success with Aer Lingus
Doubt whether Stobart have lost interest in a £100m investment - having got a somewhat surprising good start by attracting EZY, I think they are now where they could be expected to be - searching to find their niche, what will work and what won't.
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Well they did get FlyBE, which I imagine earns them some brownie points. Though this one seems to be constantly moving the goalposts, won't fault them for trying. Stobart just have to attract more (overseas) carriers. Skywork, I think, is in terminal decline, unless someone can prove me wrong. Surely there is a carrier who would take on the Kraków route (or something similar). I can only guess that there would be the demand for flights from Eastern Europe, Ezy appeared to be achieving good loads before canning it........
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I completely agree...on what grounds was the Dublin route a success? Yes there were rising passenger numbers but by no means does it make the route profitable, rest assured the 3 daily would not have been cut if the route was a cash cow! (The same goes for krakow, Belfast, Edinburgh... I would imagine!)
On a more general note, I follow the Southend thread closely and have become increasingly frustrated by the doom and gloom shown by many. 1 million plus pax has been achieved in 3 years or so, some achievement we all agree, and yes progress has leveled off lately. Does this mean Stobart have lost interest? No! Are there some projects that still need completing ( re:taxiways): Yes! Does this mean we will see no new airlines, services...ever? Certainly not! Please all stay calm as the airport catches up with its early success. The investment is too far in for it all to be chucked away now.
The airline industry is a notoriously long game in terms of attracting airlines... So simply will not happen over night. Be patient and let the airport evolve. To be frustrated at some elements of the operation is fine, to talk like Southend is a complete failure is not!
On a more general note, I follow the Southend thread closely and have become increasingly frustrated by the doom and gloom shown by many. 1 million plus pax has been achieved in 3 years or so, some achievement we all agree, and yes progress has leveled off lately. Does this mean Stobart have lost interest? No! Are there some projects that still need completing ( re:taxiways): Yes! Does this mean we will see no new airlines, services...ever? Certainly not! Please all stay calm as the airport catches up with its early success. The investment is too far in for it all to be chucked away now.
The airline industry is a notoriously long game in terms of attracting airlines... So simply will not happen over night. Be patient and let the airport evolve. To be frustrated at some elements of the operation is fine, to talk like Southend is a complete failure is not!
