b720 wrote:I think that first and foremost it is traffic cannibalised from its own operation at CRL. I guess that all of their pax originating north of Brussels, will most probably shift to BRU. Add to that the dirt cheap prices will attract some of their own clients, pus newly generated business and some from all other airlines. I think it will be more interesting to observe load factor and operations at CRL in the future, than those of SN or others in BRU.
Indeed. A few years ago, CRL-manager Buelens said that 65% of the CRL-clients come from Brussels or Flanders. So it's quite normal that they will shift to BRU. The most important figure that Dublin now will look at, is “do we have first-time-clients for our BRU-flights, or had they flown with us before?” Translated: “do we hurt the competition at BRU with our dumping prices, or are we just giving away money to existing clients who were willing to buy a more expensive ticket?”
RoMax wrote:It will be a combination. The price battle at BRU resulted in extremely low prices (especially from FR which has been selling quite some tickets which do not even cover the airport charges), which in its turn resulted in a lot of people buying tickets for a trip they maybe wouldn't have made without these low prices at BRU. Also FR will see without doubt less pax at CRL (maybe not already, but certainly this summer, capacity at CRL will be lower as well). And probably also some pax are stolen away from the carriers which were already operating on these routes from BRU. The loadfactors indeed look good, but that says nothing about the real performance of the routes yet. Many of these tickets were sold at rock bottom prices on which FR makes a significant loss. It would be interesting to know the yields, but of course that's FR management information only.
“It’s very normal that Ryanair got this 80% overall load factor: they sold at real dumping prices during the last weeks”. This is not my statement, but from Thierry Vanelslander, professor Transport Economics at the University Antwerpen, in Het Nieuwsblad 28/02/2014.
One doens’t need a computer to calculate the yield of these first flights: they’re below zero. Unless 50% of the passengers forgot to print their boarding pass at home, hadn’t checked in their luggage online, made a spelling error in their name, arrived at the gate with overseized hand luggage, etc.
The only winners in this battle so far are the passengers (quote from professor Vanelslander).
The biggest looser will be CRL, and the dismissal of David Gering (official “ex” FR) is a clear sign that CRL is very unhappy with Ryanair’s decision to open a second Belgian station.