Lufthansa, Turkish Airlines and Air France were the busiest carriers operating out of Ljubljana Jože Pučnik Airport during the first three quarters of the year, data from the Statistical Office of Slovenia shows. The three flag carriers accounted for 36% of the airport’s traffic. Although Lufthansa and Turkish Airlines were two of just three carriers to have maintained operations to the Slovenian capital for the entire nine-month period, with the other being Air Serbia, Air France restored flights to Ljubljana in March but has quickly proved a popular choice with consumers. Lufthansa was the busiest, handling just over 52.400 passengers, followed by Turkish Airlines with 27.610 travellers and then Air France with 19.818 passengers.
January - September passenger results
The French national carrier recorded the highest average cabin load factor for the span of its operations to Slovenia this year, standing at a high 82.5%. It utilised its regional Embraer E190 jet on 74% of its Ljubljana bound flights, while the E170 was used on the remaining 26% of all service. The Air France - KLM group plans to continue expanding in Ljubljana next year, with Transavia to introduce operations from Paris Orly on April 23. Air Serbia, which has maintained operations to Ljubljana with its ATR72 turboprop throughout the year, was the fourth busiest carrier. The airline has just introduced an additional two weekly flights between Belgrade and the Slovenian capital for a total of nine per week due to strong demand.
January - September passenger results
Newcomer Iberia faired relatively well. The airline only operated during the month of August, handling 2.215 passengers with a 69% average cabin load factor. The Spanish carrier is yet to confirm its return to the Slovenian market next year, although Ljubljana Airport has said it hopes the airline’s Madrid service will resume and operate for a longer period during the 2022 summer season. Flydubai introduced operations to Ljubljana only on September 24. On the six flights operated that month (three outbound and three inbound) it welcomed 258 passengers on board the Boeing 737 MAX 8 jet. In total, it had 111 passengers headed to Ljubljana and 147 from the Slovenian capital to Dubai. On other routes, easyJet and British Airways jointly handled 8.666 passengers on their London - Ljubljana operations, while Brussels Airlines and Wizz Air carried a combined total of 19.458 passengers on their flights from Brussels and Charleroi.
Good work for Air France. Do they carry mostly transfers or point to point passengers?
ReplyDeleteTransfers most likely.
Deletethey started also early morning flights at 7.00am so they are competing with Lufthansa.
DeleteSo the plane stays the night in Ljubljana?
Deleteyes.
DeletePersonally I am so happy that AF-KL has decided to compete with LH Group in ex-YU. In LJU they have AF which is growing though I don't know if Transavia still flies from AMS.
DeleteIn ZAG both seem to be penetrating nicely, putting a major dent in LHG's defenses. I am sure they played a part in LH not resuming MUC-ZAG and ZAG-VIE shrinking.
In Belgrade KLM is rapidly growing while AF relies on JU's CDG flights in winter to offer connectivity.
All this is very good because it provides passengers with more options. For the first time in a long time, LH Group has to actually work hard(er) to maintain its position in the region.
Agree with Nemjee. I'm glad to see Air France combating LH group in Ljubljana so the airport does not become a Lufthansa fortress.
DeleteThe funny thing is, Lufthansa & co would leave in an instant if they managed to get Air Dolomiti to base a plane and fly feeder routes like Adria did.
DeleteWhat's funny? Air Dolomiti are fully owned by Lufthansa, so one of subsidiaries. It's basically Lufthansa under different brand.
DeleteNice to see that AF will stay with morning departure during summer, with increased frequency to 7 morning departures:
DeleteLJU-CDG 06:50-08:50
LJU-CDG 15:10-17:10
CDG-LJU 12:45-14:45
CDG-LJU 20:00-21:50
perfect, and they even pushed back a bit departure - now it's 7.10am. Could depart at 6.30 - slovenians love to wake up early hehe
DeleteNo surprise.
ReplyDeleteAir France did really well
ReplyDeleteDespite not having a great schedule.
DeleteIt's better now with the winter schedule.
DeleteI know it's early days but those aren't great results for LJU-DXB.
ReplyDeleteWould be interesting to compare to the performance on their ZAG route.
DeleteI think it's normal first few flights. They are starting to work with tour operators. In January and February groups to Zanzibar are going with FZ via Dubai.
DeleteI just flew with them last week. there were 60 people in economy and 4 in business (10 was max). I spoke with ground staff and they told me beginning was poor but now flights are getting more and more full.
DeleteYou can't make a judgment based on the first 3 flgihts.
DeleteOh cmon this route is barely like 2 months old or even less. It will need some time.
DeleteI know a few people that flew this route and told me that aircraft was around half full in both ways
DeleteWill Iberia come back next year based on those numbers?
ReplyDeleteI'm sure they will return and add more flights next year.
DeleteThere is no excuse for Fraport if they don't.
DeleteInteresting numbers.
ReplyDeleteLufthansa rules the Slovenian market now.
ReplyDeleteIt was always the case. They just did it through their feeder Adria in the past.
DeleteAdria did benefit a lot from those passengers. If you are feeder does not necessarily means that you are losing money..
DeleteOf course it did benefit from the arrangement.
DeleteThings are definitely improving
ReplyDeleteI think there is a lot of pent up demand in Slovenia. People just want to travel.
DeleteTrue
DeleteReally interesting to see the load factor and passenger numbers. I think things will improve at LJU next year. Let's see.
ReplyDeleteWith those numbers and loads on an ATR, JU is turning a nice profit on their Ljubljana flights.
ReplyDeleteThat's why they have added more flights.
DeleteThat and US has reopened. They get quite a few transfers to JFK.
DeleteThey get almost 0 transfers to US, because the connection has a long layover in BEG. Source: work in a travel agency, sold 0 tickets via BEG.
DeleteThats roughly 37 pax per flight. And just yesterday there was a few people commenting how JU should dump the ATR.
DeleteHope KLM replaces Transavia.
ReplyDeleteWhy? With Transavia you get cheaper fares.
Deletehope KLM just add some flights to Amsterdam. Im sure they would be successful. In the past Adria operated successfully 2 daily flights even with transavia flying to Ljubljana.
DeleteExacrly. There is enough room for both. Like with Paris.
Delete*exactly
DeleteProbably in 2023.
DeleteIf Transavia has a load factor of 67% with lower fares, KLM won't replace Transavia anytime soon.
DeleteJust flew with Flydubai, they were almost full
ReplyDeleteGood to hear
DeleteInteresting to see LJU will be served by 2 Paris airports. I guess Transavia will take over the P2P traffic.
ReplyDeleteNot necessarily. It may also generate completely new passengers.
DeleteAir France is almost fully booked all the time.
ReplyDeleteLH and AF will benefit now from Ljubljana too with the reopening of the US to the EU.
ReplyDeleteTK too to some extent.
DeleteDo people from LJU really backtrack to IST to catch a flight to the US?
DeleteI would assume they are mostlt used to transfer to Asia.
DeleteFor a cheper fare, people are very much willing to slightly backtrack.
DeleteLet's see how Flydubai impacts TK.
Delete@anon 09:23 , yes quite often my colleagues would fly to US via IST or WAW, also the other way, when we have visitors from US, they would also come via IST or WAW. Btw. I am talking prepandemic.
DeleteHuge differences between first, second and third busiest.
ReplyDeleteNo one will be able to catch up to LH.
DeleteEspecially when they eventually restore Munich.
Delete@9.21 well they do have the most flights so it makes sense.
DeleteI think Ljubljana could see next summer (in a peak season) something like this below:
ReplyDeleteMoscow 7 pw
St Petersburg 2 pw
Frankfurt 21 pw
Munich 7 pw
Berlin 3 pw
Paris 16 pw
Amsterdam 4 pw
Belgrade 14 pw
Nis 2 pw
Tivat 3 pw
Podgorica 3 pw
Skopje 2 pw
Istanbul 14 pw
Dubai 3 pw
London 21 pw
Brussels 10 pw
Warsaw 7 pw
Helsinki 7 pw
Zurich 7 pw
Madrid 3 pw
Tel Aviv 2 pw
Kiev 2 pw
and 20-30 pw charter flights
Who would opefate Skopje?
DeleteWizz
DeleteThat would be ideal. Hope it happens.
DeleteINI-LJU performed really well in summer. It's a shame JU doesn't have enough ATRs as they could switch the A319 with it and boost frequencies to 4 to 5 weekly flights.
Deleteforget SKP, in Adria times it was feeder from Kosovo.
DeleteNice to see Air Serbia performing well in LJU. No wonder they boosted it now in November. I am sure the market is there for 14 weekly next summer.
ReplyDeleteAn we should see Nis-Ljubljana back too.
DeleteThose might come back as early as January.
DeleteIt's logical that airlines the flew all year (including Jan-March when there were barely any passengers) have a worse load factor then Air France or LOT which started later on.
ReplyDeletethey must be really busy that LJU achieved 21% of pre-pandemic traffic. Keep the good work Fraport and government! #sarcasmOFF
ReplyDelete:D
DeleteI hope we will see more new airlines and routes.
ReplyDeleteHope to see more LCCs.
DeleteNow we just need a national airline.
ReplyDeleteCan someone explain to me why LJU has been so affected compared to other nearby airports?
ReplyDeleteStrict entry requirements and restriction during first quarter of the year, Adria gone, small market.
DeleteThere are countries which had even more strict entry requirements and did not have such disastrous result. Small market..it's true but you have to know that LJU was within top 5 airports on EX-YU area and now we are 11th? So there is potential...
DeleteI believe 10 years ago LJU was 3. busiest. And to go from 3. to 11. in just 10 years is a disaster.
DeleteLufthansa dominance.
ReplyDeleteStar Alliance even more so.
DeleteStill waiting for LH resume Munich
ReplyDeleteand more important, at what time they will operate. If they will resume flights as they do for ZRH/BRU (once per day and even that flight is in the middle of the day) then it does not make sense...
DeleteMunich - Ljubljana 11.15-12.15
DeleteLjubljana - Munich 12.55 - 13.55
Lufthansa group with much better schedule in summer, still not optimal:
DeleteLJU-FRA 07:00-02:20
LJU-MUC 12:55-13:55
LJU-FRA 13:45-15:05
LJU-FRA 14:45-16:05
LJU-ZRH 14:45-16:00
LJU-BRU 16:25-18:15
MUC-LJU 11:15-12:15
FRA-LJU 11:30-12:45
ZRH-LJU 12:50-14:00
FRA-LJU 13:00-14:10
BRU-LJU 14:00-15:40
FRA-LJU 20:30-21:45
Let's wait till summer season, there will be changes till then (unfortunately it always get worse in case of LJU)
DeleteApparently, MUC might be brough back earlier than summer 2022.
DeleteWhich airlines still have to return that haven't?
ReplyDeleteThey are all back
DeleteThe most important one .... JP
DeleteAll have resumed flights except Finnair but they return next summer.
DeleteLet Wizz set up a base!
ReplyDeleteNo one is stopping them. It's just that they want money for it.
Deletemeaning a LOT of money! With no gastoz around EU and with very limited tourists number Slovenia as itself is not a market for LCC base. Some flights yes, but to have 6 flights per day with 180+ seater..forget it!
DeleteI can only imagine what they asked from the government.
DeleteI'm surprised that there is no Brussels Airlines on the list as one of the Lufthansa group operator.
ReplyDeleteIt's mentioned in the article.
DeleteYes, combined with Wizz. Would be interesting to compare Lufthansa group operators.
DeleteIs there any chance Austrian will launch flights to Ljubljana?
ReplyDeleteno
DeleteAir Montenegro has done well
ReplyDelete