British Airways
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Does it make sense to keep a handful of services, ie the L/H flights at LGW, if the S/H flights as Turin suggests are moved to LHR.
By removing the 744 fleet from the system this releases the stands. Presumably the unused slots need covering too otherwise they will be lost. LHR slots are more valuable than LGW slots
By removing the 744 fleet from the system this releases the stands. Presumably the unused slots need covering too otherwise they will be lost. LHR slots are more valuable than LGW slots
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Surely with what’s gone on recently, the answer could now be different?
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I am not sure what the benefit of this would be. Why move routes from LCY where there is limited competition so presumably reasonable returns, to LGW where you would be up against EZY and others? As mentioned elsewhere, I don't believe the maths of flying an E190 stack up against an A320 or B738.
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I am not sure what the benefit of this would be. Why move routes from LCY where there is limited competition so presumably reasonable returns, to LGW where you would be up against EZY and others? As mentioned elsewhere, I don't believe the maths of flying an E190 stack up against an A320 or B738.
LCY isn’t that useful without business connectivity which will decline for a period. For the few that can access central London easily, LCY works but it is easy enough to train it to LGW or LHR as an alternative. CF could keep the key business routes to and from Amsterdam, Scotland and Ireland etc and readjust their non core business and leisure. Florence as an example is served by Vueling from LGW but not at the same frequency; that could transfer to CF along with introducing some niche routes like San Sebastián. This is just two routes but I am sure others could be identified. Besides EasyJet and Ryanair offer low fares and obtain profit on their ancillaries. Buy on Board has all but stopped and with customers being advised to check in as much as they can to reduce movement in the cabin the adding on of baggage suddenly sees those low fares increase.
It’s just a thought but without any access to the numbers of then and now/predicted it’s hard to gauge demand on routes and what cost increases there are to handling flights, which will potentially be passed back to the consumer anyway.
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I agree some of your points are reasonable and as a short term solution, maybe for domestics as well, the lower trip costs of an EMB vs 320 or 737 could be useful. However problem one is that I don’t think BA care enough about LGW to come up with an innovative solution (would love to be proved wrong) and problem two is that if you build up a route on an EMB to a level where it’s profitable, a RYR or an EZY or even these days a WIZ fancies having a go at it and there is a maxim to the effect that in a competitive situation, eventually the lower/lowest cost provider will always win.
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But the STN flights operated, I am sure, on a marginal cost basis which is ok for a small part of your business if you haven’t got anything better to do with the asset, but you can’t run a significant chunk of your business like that. I’ve often wondered if that was part of Flybe’s problem. I’d love to see some of their management accounts.
It's also something of a myth that travel there is wholly connected with Canary Wharf - its catchment area spreads wide, as is apparent from conversation with those seated alongside me. It's the most convenient for Central London, especially those doing day return trips, and you find people from outer London, Essex, Kent etc make a considerable proportion of the load. One regular traveller I know from London to Athens finds it quicker to use Swiss, connecting at Zurich, than trek out to Heathrow or Gatwick for a direct flight.
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This is the time that senior management will earn their corn, they will either make or break BA with decisions made in the next few weeks. It is very difficult to keep a major corporation at the top of the game all the time, many have got to the top and then faded away due poor senior management decisions.
So BA seems like they want to dump Lgw, apart from a few LH routes. BA has never been fully committed to Lgw. I remember many years ago, when you could still get paper copies of the timetable, being amused at the way that Lhr was always pushed over Lgw on routes that were flown from both airports, even when the Lhr connections were not quite so good, e.g Gla-Lgw/Lhr-xxx.
Various reports state that travel will not recover to 2019 levels until 2022, or 2023, or 2024. In terms of the lifetime of a large corporation like BA, those 3 or 4 years are but a blink. If they give up most of their slots at Lgw, which are considerable in number, what happens when travel is back to 2019 levels? Lhr will be full and Lgw may well be nearing capacity as well. A third runway at Lhr still years away. When they need to expand, where will they go - Southend? I see some airlines saying they will emerge a smaller carrier. Long term, they won't exist as they will have been taken over. Standing still means going backwards in reality. Interesting times ahead for our London, sorry national carrier, which might not be our national carrier a few years from now.
Wonder how long it will be before Ezy apply for some slots in BA's home turf?
So BA seems like they want to dump Lgw, apart from a few LH routes. BA has never been fully committed to Lgw. I remember many years ago, when you could still get paper copies of the timetable, being amused at the way that Lhr was always pushed over Lgw on routes that were flown from both airports, even when the Lhr connections were not quite so good, e.g Gla-Lgw/Lhr-xxx.
Various reports state that travel will not recover to 2019 levels until 2022, or 2023, or 2024. In terms of the lifetime of a large corporation like BA, those 3 or 4 years are but a blink. If they give up most of their slots at Lgw, which are considerable in number, what happens when travel is back to 2019 levels? Lhr will be full and Lgw may well be nearing capacity as well. A third runway at Lhr still years away. When they need to expand, where will they go - Southend? I see some airlines saying they will emerge a smaller carrier. Long term, they won't exist as they will have been taken over. Standing still means going backwards in reality. Interesting times ahead for our London, sorry national carrier, which might not be our national carrier a few years from now.
Wonder how long it will be before Ezy apply for some slots in BA's home turf?
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Great points made True Blue. Here would be my take on this. BA will not want to make access by Wizz and Ryanair into LGW easy as they would certainly impact LHR yield. BA will be waiting to see what the slot usage rules look like for Winter. If they are strict BA will double down on LHR, makes sense. Very fluid situation. Beyond the obvious LGW poor relation position for BA, we are now looking into a transformed cost base that will give BA (Aer Lingus style cost transformation) the tools to fight easyJet on a sustainable footing. Let's hope BA think long term.
They are faced with some multifaceted challenges to solve..
They are faced with some multifaceted challenges to solve..
Last edited by EI-BUD; 11th Aug 2020 at 06:52.
The reason BA didn’t love Gatwick is because BA was a full service airline offering connections, had in house engineering and handling and also various franchise partners. All were additional costs against almost everyone else at LGW. So whereas BA could command a LHR premium, they couldn’t do the same at LGW. The way to profitability was to cut, slash and simplify. The hub went, handling was outsourced, engineering was cut way back. The “hand me down” fleet ex LHR was supplemented by 3rd hand A320s, something of first for BA. Hence they seemed to get into the black on point to point leisure routes, all of which are actually non core to everything at LHR. Overlap and duplication is the first to go in a travel slump, followed by routes that don’t support the wider strategy (feeding US long haul at LHR, and yes that’s also screwed).
I think the V shaped recovery wasn’t an option for travel. I said months ago this summer was lost, the winter is lost too, any bounce back will be next summer. So it makes no business sense to fly what was already a greatly pruned short haul winter program in this worst of winters out of LGW.
Also worth remebering, easyJet are also in a horrible place, everyone is.
I think the V shaped recovery wasn’t an option for travel. I said months ago this summer was lost, the winter is lost too, any bounce back will be next summer. So it makes no business sense to fly what was already a greatly pruned short haul winter program in this worst of winters out of LGW.
Also worth remebering, easyJet are also in a horrible place, everyone is.
