EJ to expand

[scrotometer]

SEVEN NEW ROUTES ANNOUNCED TODAY


easyJet welcomes Hungary and Slovenia to the EU with low cost flights - Basel also added to the easyJet network.

As part of the easyJet expansion in 2004, Europe's leading low-cost airline, today announced seven new routes, of which three are completely new destinations, bringing low-cost airline services within reach of millions more Europeans.
The routes are:


London Stansted to Basel and Ljubljana International
London Luton to Budapest International
London Gatwick to Naples, Ibiza, Faro and Prague

Ten new countries join the EU on May 1st and easyJet is embracing the enlargement by welcoming Hungary and Slovenia to the EU from the very first day with flights to London.

These NEW routes, which will bring the easyJet network to 135 routes, will allow millions of travellers to visit the new EU member states from this summer with our famously low fares, starting from £30.98 return (including all taxes).

easyJet is also expanding further in Switzerland with a new service to London, from Basel's Euro Airport,
which serves Basel, popular with business travellers, and skiers alike; Mulhouse in Eastern France, and Freiburg in South West Germany, that provides access to the Black Forest and the Rhine Valley. The airline already ranks as the biggest airline at Geneva Airport and recently announced that it was withdrawing its service from London Gatwick to Zurich Airport due an excessive increase in landing charges in Zurich.

Slovenia is considered as one of the most up and coming ski, and summer holiday destinations, while its capital, Ljubljana, is famous for its Baroque Old Town and, according to legend, was founded by Greek prince Jason, together with his companions, the Argonauts, best known for the story of the Golden Fleece and slaying the Ljubljana dragon.

With its rich cultural heritage, Budapest, Hungary's capital is known as the 'Paris of Eastern Europe'. The city straddles a gentle curve in the Danube. It has broad avenues, leafy parks and elaborate bathhouses.

easyJet is taking delivery of 20 brand new aircraft (5 Boeing 737-700's s and 15 Airbus A319's) this summer, increasing the fleet to 90 aircraft, and expects to announce more exciting developments to its expansion plans shortly.

Ray Webster, easyJet Chief Executive said:

"This is a very exciting time for easyJet, as there are many great opportunities for growth in Europe at present. Having already announced the establishment of major operations from Berlin Schönefeld, today's announcement is a further key step in the planned growth of easyJet and is a result of the airport tender that we announced in mid-2003.

"In December 2003 we announced our intention to withdraw our service from London Gatwick to Zurich Airport due to an excessive increase in landing charges (132% increase in passenger fees in only two years). The addition of Basel to the easyJet network demonstrates that our future lies with those airports that embrace the low-cost model and want to be part of easyJet's long-term future growth.

"With 10 new Member States joining the EU from 1st May, the market for low-cost airline services will expand dramatically. We plan to be part of that expansion from the very first day".

Seats go on sale Thursday 11th February.

These seven new routes are in addition to the 14 new routes already announced this year, due to commence this summer;
1st May: Luton - Berlin; Newcastle - Nice
9th May: Liverpool - Berlin
17th May: Newcastle - Berlin; Newcastle - Palma(Majorca)
18th May: Berlin - Paris (Orly); Paris(Orly) - Naples
25th May: Berlin - Athens; Berlin - Copenhagen; Berlin - Nice
1st June: Berlin - Bristol; Berlin - Palma (Majorca)
10th June: Berlin - Barcelona
24th June: Berlin - Naples

[ettore]

Copied-pasted from easyJet website:

easyJet is expanding further in Switzerland with a new service to London, from Basel's Euro Airport, which serves Basel, popular with business travellers and skiers alike; Mulhouse in Eastern France, and Freiburg in South West Germany, providing access to the Black Forest and the Rhine Valley. The airline already ranks as the biggest airline at Geneva Airport and recently announced that it was withdrawing its service from London Gatwick to Zurich Airport due an excessive increase in landing charges in Zurich.

EuroAiport also suggests in its Press releases in German and French that the daily flight Stansted-Basel might be only the start of a larger EZ operation at EuroAirport. Some people say it could base up to 4 or 5 planes in Basel.

If so, does any one knows what would/will happen with the planed extension of its GVA base? easyJet is negociating cheaper Pax taxes in GVA and a "simplified service" at the old GVA terminal in exchange for increasing the number of its A/C based there from 5 to 10.

AF reacted strongly, threatening GVA Airport with retaliation if it went on with this "discrimination" and "unfair competition".

In other words, is the easyJet move toward Basel a sign that the GVA plan stalled?

[dwlpl]

I would have thought that the easyJet routes out of Basle would have lasting implications for Zurich continuing as a base rather than Geneva.

[10 DME ARC]

Just as a matter of interest, the NCL-Palma & NCL-Nice are both being sold now from the 1st May.:)

[Whippersnapper]

And how are they going to crew these flights?

[MD11FAN]

Easyjet seem to have picked some good routes imo..STN-BSL and STN-LJU?(LJUBLJANA). I have flown many times to Basle between 3-5 years ago and the route was dominated by BA/SR and little competition meant..high fares. Basle/Mulhouse also has a large catchment area(as mentioned in previous post) with alot of industry. The route to Ljubljana also seems a good choice..Slovenia a very under-rated destination for holidays. I believe it was the first region to gain independance from Yugoslavia and escaped largely unscathed from the war in that region.

[LTNman]

Today’s easyJet announcement is BAA 6 TBI 1, not very good me thinks but then TBI seems to have run out of investment money at Luton and the airlines have noticed.

Also after many rumours about BMI baby coming to Luton they announce that Gatwick is their London airport of choice. Make that BAA 8 TBI 1

No hang on I forgot Monarch’s announcement, lets call it BAA 10 TBI 1.

Why stop there, we also had Britannia's announcement this week concerning Gatwick. Final score BAA 12 TBI 1 thanks mainly to Luton based airlines scoring 10 goals.

I wonder what the board of TBI make of this? Maybe they just accept that are a bunch of losers with empty pockets
:mad:

[Powerjet1]

Ltn Man

Couldn't agree more. Virtually nothing has materialised over the last 3/4 months as was intimated. Indeed, from a source ' close to the action', several new routes and up to three new airlines were expected to have announced ops by this time. What have we got - two new routes from easy!!!!!! Wow. No new ryan, no expansion by Monarch, Flybe decreased from a daily summer Jersey to saturday only, Now dead in the water and as for new airlines, where are they, STN & LGW of course.

In the goverments white paper the airport was given permission in principal to increase passenger numbers to 30m over the next 25 years. At this rate LTN will still be trying to get to 10m.

As an aside, had heard that Jet2 might possibly be in the frame. . They have done a deal with TBI at BFS re LBA & PRG but can't really see Jet2 sitting in easy's garden, even if it was on totally different routes. However PRG would go down a storm at LTN.

[Buster the Bear]

LTN man, I cannot stop laughing at your final comment, you have made my day.

I would imagine that TBI shareholders would be somewhat alarmed to think that new business within the London area is not coming Luton's way!

[Powerjet1]

FT reporting that easy will announce Dortmund as its second German base today with eight routes starting soon after Berlin in May/June. Cologne is expected to be added to network with an announcement next week.

[Rocket Ron]

All these new routes and bases... we could do with a few more pilots...!:confused:

[Powerjet1]

Its official. Dortmund is easy's next european base.

[Localiser Green]

Dortmund base confirmed, with 8 destinations from May 2004:

CDG
LTN
NCE
PMI
ALC
CIA

and 2 to be announced. 3 based a/c initially.

easyJet Statement (http://www.easyjet.com/EN/news/20040213_02.html)

[ettore]

dwlpl wrote on 12th February 2004 at 17:36 :
----------------------------------------------------------------------

I would have thought that the easyJet routes out of Basle would have lasting implications for Zurich continuing as a base rather than Geneva.

ZRH is not an EZJ base. It holds there less than 2% of the market share and will hold even less: EZJ is cancelling its daily flight Gatwick-ZRH, only keeping its Luton-ZRH flight.

EZJ says the pax tax in ZRH is way to expensive (CHF 36.-) to make the Gatwick flight attractive enough for its customers. Luton tax is cheaper than the Gatwick one and can compensate for the expensive one in ZRH.

On another hand, EZJ has a base in GVA for 5 A/C. It is negociating or has negociated the reopening of an old terminal in GVA for the winter shedule 2005-2006, with a "simplified service" that would allow all companies interested in using this old terminal to pay less than the actual CHF 19.- pax tax, which is already quite cheap.

In exchange for the 5 to 10 million Swiss francs reshuffle of the old terminal by the GVA airport, EZJ would double its presence there, with a base of 10 A/C instead of 5 now.

If EuroAirport in Basel offers an even better deal, EZJ could shift its plan from GVA to Basel.

Basel has some advantages: no concurrence from the high-speed train GVA-Paris, a number of whaelthy business pax thanks to the pharmaceutical industry, a market deserted by the Swiss Int'l national carrier, and so on...

Therefore, it would be highly interesting to know if the deal between EZJ and the GVA airport has been closed or if it still being negociated...:8