Notice Bulgaria Air are flying in this afternoon from Sofia, this a single flight or regular charter?

Operated last week too, could well be for Balkan holidays.
Also to note is Eurowongs started its flights yesterday to Düsseldorf 3 days ahead of its original scheduled first flight.

No service to CDG and ridiculously small figures to AMS. If I was an inhabitant of the East Midlands I would not be happy with what the owners of the airport are supplying in terms of service to these 2 hubs. Quite clearly underlying demand is not being met. I struggle to think that this is anything other than strategy. It is certainly helping another airport get on its feet. The service to Eastern Europe, Amsterdam and Paris from EMA is well below the underlying natural demand from this region. The figures are there for all to see.

Can't understand the poor services to both which were well served in the past. Surely considering some of the regional airports they serve KLM could give it a go?

Paris is an odd one especially with high demand likely this summer for the Euro 2016 finals (I'm flying from LHR as nothing at EMA)

Pains me to say this, but why would they - and simple dilute traffic from existing services from LBA and BHX? KLM probably discovered similar when they tried, and subsequently dropped service from LPL.

CDG is a bit more of a mystery, but then again how much new traffic could Air France expect to gain, over and above that which they normally carry. Clearly FlyBe didn't get the right loads / yields to make it work.

Even given the (dysfunctional and inadequate) A42/M42, EMA is just too close to BHX. KLM don't even serve AMS from LGW, preferring concentrate their efforts on LHR.

I always thought it was airlines that operated flights?

Seabrooks make the lovely crisps and Morrisons make sure that they are available to satisfy the demand for them from the customer. Hence my wording.

Simply saying that other nearby airports are satisfying the demand is not a satisfactory answer in my opinion. These are not marginal routes. BHX could quite happily move everyone to PMI too. I believe it is a strategic airport decision.

I am not talking about KLM particularly - just the potential underlying demand from the distance catchment.

LPL moved 26354 to AMS in Feb 16 and EMA moved 3736. Astonishing. Just what DSA needs after 10 years.

So you think EMA are stopping/discouraging airlines flying to hubs such as CDG and AMS? What's your reasoning? evidence?

Seabrooks make the best crisps in UK - knock Walkers into a cocked hat. I doubt those down south know what they are missing!!!

LPL / AMS is overwhelmingly point to point leisure traffic - with EZY. Now of course Jet2 could offer EMA / AMS but choose not to, possibly because it doesn't fit their business model.

If any airline saw the opportunity to make money of these routes from EMA you can be sure they wouldn't be slow in opening them - there is no way that EMA would be preventing them from doing so. I wish there was more of a business offering from EMA, rather than over reliance on the bucket and spade market; and on one carrier in particular, which has also probably not served the airport well in enabling them to attract new carriers and routes.

The problem is EMA have a long term deal with Walkers and rather than risk upsetting the arrangement, they are quite prepared to let those who wish to buy other brands of crisps travel to DSA or BHX to do so......explains all doesn't it?

Balair

Balair speaks the most sense. Evidence is not something you will find.

"there is no way that EMA would be preventing them from doing so" = naïve

All kinds of jiggery pokery goes on between airports and airports and airlines and airlines.

We can all argue about it until the cows come home but what cannot be disputed are those astonishing figures I quoted earlier. Agreed. It's not often you can say Teesside whups your ar$e! A certain airport CANNOT be allowed to fail whatever it takes.

Ah, who'd have guessed, just more of the LA anti-MAN agenda... :ok:

Where were all these hub routes before MAN took over? :confused:

It's probably true that EMA have given Walkers such prominence on their "shelves" that it makes it harder for Seabrooks to get a foothold - that is a mistake in my view.

However, if Seabrooks wanted to make a fight of it and pay (as in invest) money in developing their brand at EMA then if they thought that EMA (through MAG) were blocking them they'd be quite right to go running to the competition commission, and I feel sure they would - and they'd win.

Incidentally, can you buy Seabrooks crisps at EMA? Just wondered!

That's a completely flawed analogy. In your case Seabrooks will most likely want as many outlets as possible, and will lobby/offer financial incentives to Morrisons to carry their crisps. In the case of an airline whilst an airport can facilitate them by way of facilities and financial incentives, it will only happen if the airline decides it can operate the service if it can make a better profit compared to other destinations.

That calculation will include diluting profits from other routes. Deciding not to operate a route doesn't necessarily mean that it can't fill a couple of aircraft a day, and cover its operating costs.

EMA's failure was letting Go and the harps in on an almost unfettered basis. There was room for a downsized alliance-style offer, which bmi had been delivering prior to that on a larger scale, but Bish got scared and changed his fiefdom to baby. All the transfer traffic, and quite a bit of the business market, went down the M42 almost overnight. Over there, they realised the importance of and have really pulled out all the stops to stay on / get on the global alliance maps, and its paying off. EMA now has Brussels! Hahaha! So never mind MAG strategy, the stage was set long ago. Adding to the woes, the big airport down the road never used to offer deals to prospective airlines but now it does. The implications are clear - they can match or beat EMA (and indeed they have done), whereas hands are more tied due to the risk of upsetting the rather fickle incumbents. Twelve new airlines over there in the last year, two (maybe three if Cobalt make it) at EMA. Double digit growth down the M42, stagnation at EMA. Airlines might start viable routes without incentives, but if there is a choice of airports 35 miles apart and one offers a better deal than the other then the path they are likely to take is fairly obvious. Furthermore, Paris won't work from EMA now without AF connectivity - Eurostar is just too easy for point-to-point. Up at LPL (seeing as folks want to compare the two), Flybe's AMS failed because they couldn't secure connectivity with KL and the point-to-point preferred EZY's jets. From EMA, AMS might work if someone made a proper go of it - Flybe's paltry once in the middle of the day with no code share doesn't cut it - but I suspect that market too will become more limited once Eurostar gets its act together up there next year. The test now will be to see how Eurowings does - I suspect it'll get dropped, but I hope not.

EastMids

I am astounded that you find a situation brought about by the loss of life resulting from a terrorist attack in Brussels even remotely funny. I suggest you give consideration to what you type in future.

Balair

Nothing to do with the terrorists attacks - I was merely saying that a single route to Brussels is about as much use as a chocolate teapot when it comes to global connectivity - what I said was in the context of the previous sentence, if you care to read it properly. Balair - I suggest you think how to interpret things in future.

EastMids,

Thank you for the instruction. Having re-read your post properly I can now see just how hilariously funny the situation inwhich EMA finds itself is regarding the Brussels route. If you had included the "chocolate teapot" similly in your original post my ability to interpret and understand your apparent amusement would have been that much easier.

I apologise for doubting your integrity.

Balair

Jet2.com Summer 2017
 

Increases up to 7 based aircraft - New routes to Girona, Naples and Split, plus Paris-CDG returns at 4x weekly. Perhaps unsurprisingly, Antalya and Bodrum appear to have been dropped.

East Midlands has carved itself a couple of very nice market niches in high volume/low yield point to point passenger traffic and cargo. Not every airport needs to be a spoke in somebodies global network. It's a thriving place now as opposed to when BMA ruled the roost - then the place was a dead hole most of the time.