NEWS FLASH
Air Serbia handled over 25.000 passengers on its new long-haul service between Belgrade and Chicago launched in mid-May. The result represents a strong start in just under five months of operations. Although the carrier has not provided an exact figure for the number of passengers carried on the route, if one was to take the reported 25.000, a number the carrier says it exceeded, the average cabin load factor since its launch stands at just over 80%, a high figure for a new transatlantic service. During the upcoming 2023/24 winter season, which begins on October 29, Air Serbia will maintain two weekly flights between Belgrade and the Windy City, increasing to three weekly during the peak holiday travel period, from December 18, 2023 until January 7, 2024.
That's quite a result for a new route. I hope the numbers will be good during the winter season as well.
ReplyDeleteBravo Air Serbia π·πΈπ·πΈπ·πΈ
ReplyDeleteIt was quite an expensive ticket from ORD to BEG round trip. But the convenience of not having to transfer in the EU and saving time was well worth the extra cost. Hoping they can bump it up to double daily next year.
ReplyDeleteWell, double daily will not happen any time soon as they do not have enough aircrafts AND market is not there yet. Increase from 3PW to 4 or 5 PW is more realistic and introduction of MIA.
Delete+1
DeleteDouble daily, c'mon...
DeleteMan o man ...
DeleteBetter get larger plane, maybe it's easier finding A350
DeleteEven daily is a stretch for now but perhaps in a decade. And some good marketing.
ReplyDeleteDecade? I give it at most 5 years for daily.
DeleteJust out of curiosity is there no demand from detroit or cleveland anymore? If im not mistaken wasn’t there flights to both destinations long ago? Lol
ReplyDeleteThere were.
DeleteCleveland has large SLO diaspora, also CRO and SRB.
I wonder if a 2/3 week flight from Belgrade to Cleveland would work considering the SLO,CRO and SRB population and since i dont believe CLE has flights to Europe, americans could connect in Belgrade?
DeleteThat would be wonderful. Indeed, I don't know why AirSerbia isn't doing more marketing in Chicago for Americans to fly the route to nearby European destinations that it regularly flies to, like Rome.
DeleteLast Saturday, the flight was almost full (95%+ in economy). Compared to other airlines that I have flown to Chicago (LOT, Turkish, Lufthansa, KLM, Austrian, Swiss), AirSerbia is better in that there was AirSerbia staff next to the baggage claim belt. She helped passengers which needed to fill out forms for missing luggage, and she helped a passenger who forgot to take a suitcase before crossing the border. She was also helpful in other matters. I can imagine this means quite a bit to those passengers that do not speak English or are in Chicago for the first time. During the flight, there was a heated argument among two passengers, with yelling, cursing and interesting use of a pillow. The crew handled that well. The crew was very attentive. The meal surprisingly tasteful.
ReplyDeleteBad things: the flight departed 40 minutes late. It seems that the flight to Chicago usually departs late.
The on-board entertainment system is not that good. It had no flight data, no option for Serbian, graphics are not in AirSerbia colors, etc.
Good thing is that they tried to add selection of Chinese movies.
The plane used for the flight was Pupin. One can see that the plane is a bit older. There are seats that do not work properly (the seat reclines on its own, etc.), things that are taped over in the toilet, etc. The good thing is that they used AirSerbia tape, so it does not look that bad.
To me, it seems that the critical things are to:
- Decrease the delay at the departure and to
- Improve the cabin experience.
I noticed that the “smaller” airlines such as LOT and AirSerbia have issues being on time. Out of 5 flights I had with LOT, four were very late, usually an hour or even more. The one that was “on-time” was late about 20 minutes. I guess, unlike Lufthansa, if even one flight to Belgrade or Warsaw, with a passenger to Chicago is late, they need to wait for it.
Lufthansa, has many other flight, so they do no need to wait - they can just transfer the passenger on some other flight.
Problem for AirSerbia is that being late makes catching a good connecting flight out of Chicago hard. Especially on the Saturday flight that should land at 21:20.
The crew was quite good, better experience that on LOT or Lufthansa group. The crew is on pair with Turkish, but the cabin experience is not.
Why were the two passengers flighting? Was the issue resolved in the end?
DeleteAir Serbia doesn't really care about onboard experience. They have been flying long-haul for over 6 years now yet they made minimal investment in their hard product.
@Anonymous 06:17
DeleteIt seems that you are right about AirSerbia not caring that much about onboard experience.
My first flight with AirSerbia to New York in 2018 was better in terms of cabin experience. It is shame to see that after five or so years, experience is worse.
Maybe because I'm not an expert, but it is strange that they did not make sure that in-flight entertainment has AirSerbia colors and Serbian as an option.
Anyway, I hope they will improve.
I'm not sure what the fight was about. Take the next with a pinch of salt.
One passenger had a small dog. He and a lady were seating in the middle row. The lady next to him said the fight broke out when she warned him to prevent his dog from "hitting and touching her".
The other passenger claimed that the problem was that she was sleeping leaned on him for a very long time and he found that to be rude – so he said to her not to do it. Other passengers said that the lady slept leaning on him, taking two seats.
It was strange to see so much shouting, curse words, and pillows, over something not that important. Also, some other passengers joined in, shouting as well.
This was some seven hours into the flight when most passengers were sleeping
Anyway, the point is that the crew acted well. They separated passengers, talked to them, made sure that they tone down.
To make everyone feel better, as soon as they could, they gave out extra Chips bags and drinks.
And price? 'Convenience' and Patriotism aside, it should be more competitive with, let's say, LOT?
ReplyDeleteIt is a direct flight, and Air Serbia should respond with something better than being the most expensive transatlantic flight from Belgrade!
Quite the contrary, if you want the perk of a direct flight you need to pay for that. Otherwise you have many 1-stop options.
DeleteWhy didnt the idioti initially start the Chicago route Not NYC...Of course they had to be hip...ziveli
ReplyDelete