NEWS FLASH
Barcelona Airport reported that over 200.000 passengers flew between Spain’s second largest city and Belgrade in 2023. The route, served by both Air Serbia and Wizz Air, saw 204.998 travellers last year, up 96.6% on 2022. A total of 100.708 additional passengers were carried year-on-year. Spain has emerged as one of the most popular travel markets from Serbia over the past year, with Belgrade now linked to Madrid, Malaga, Palma de Mallorca, and Valencia, in addition to Barcelona, with scheduled flights.
Impressive!
ReplyDeleteIndeed!! 🇷🇸✈️🇪🇸
DeleteWho would have thought that much capacity would bring that much demand!? It’s intriguing and impressive!
DeleteAnd in 2009 there were almost no flights between BEG and Spain. Crazy. Iberia could have come years ago and scooped up all that traffic.
ReplyDelete+1
DeleteAnyone could, even Air Serbia or Wizz.
DeleteAnd that's just what happened. The point is that Iberia or a Spanish LCC could have taken a piece of the kolač.
DeleteI can't expect Iberia to prioritize Belgrade, but I would expect Air Serbia or Wizz launching BCN before Warsaw or Lyon...
DeleteIberia doesn't have to prioritize Beograd but it could have, still could, add 2-3 weekly and take a piece of the torta.
DeleteSpanair used to direct flights to Madrid and Barcelona back in 2009/10, then in 2011 only Barcelona
DeleteI just don’t get why are the flights still fairly expensive, Im sure they can further increase frequencies in the summer
ReplyDeleteNot sure if you know how works, when there is more demand then available seats the price stays high .
DeleteYou guys forgot that this year: 1) Vueling out of the market 2) Wizz Air facing engine issues / less capacity & frequencies + more demand = higher prices 3) Air Serbia also decided to consolidate this year (perfect timing haha), they cut previously planned frequencies: I was supposed to fly May 11th BCN-BEG they called a month before and said I can choose 10th or 12th, while 10th before also had 2x daily freq. & now 1.
DeleteI fly on average every other month to Barcelona & lately the prices have been extremely high because of these factors. Load on my last 3.4 BEG-MAD & 12.5 BCN-BEG were both about 90-95%. Great job!
I’m expecting a nice boom next summer as air serbia is planning going back to growth & this is one of their strong markets, Wizz fixes engine issues, & maybe we see Vueling or Iberia back ;)
Also: for my trip in August, because I must fly on certain dates because of work, I was forced to plan to drive to VIE & fly from there to Spain & back. :D
Flew JU BEG-BCN a few times in the last year or so and paid as low as 9k and as high as 19k RSD which I think is an ok price range especially compared to some other destinations in JU network
DeleteWe have an event coming up in Barcelona in late September. JU is from I remember 44.000 while Wizz return flight is sold out. Crazy.
DeleteWhy there is no third player at routes like this, I keep repeating this question but in vein.
Delete*vain
DeleteBecause the world map at the Iberia headquarter doesnt show Serbia.
DeleteEast of Croatia is finito.
If Wizz and Air Serbia had more capacity they would deploy it to Spain. No doubt both will increase it next summer.
DeleteBut there are many other options, everyone flies to BCN: Vueling, easyJet, Eurowings, Ryanair, Air Europa...
DeleteThere is a good reason why they don't. Think about it.
DeleteWe need BCN route in Ljubljana
ReplyDeleteAbsolutely!
DeleteVueling dislikes this.
ReplyDeleteA very good example of why national (or local) airlines are important, unlike what many in the comments claim. No Spanish carrier bothered to explore this route, besides Vueling with some miserable seasonal 2AM flights which were always delayed several hours and were only operated to keep aircraft utilization up overnight. Air Serbia and Wizz Air managed to handle 200,000+ passengers on this route in a single year, yet no Spanish carrier saw the potential. So when there is some unserved route and people say "oh its not served because there is no demand", it obviously isn't always the case.
ReplyDeleteI think this is very good example of how ignorant businesses can be. But I think the same about Air Serbia, Wizz and Vueling. Good thing they came to their senses but they lost a lot of money while neglecting Spanish market for at least 5 years prior to the flights. Anyone travelling from Budapest or Timisoara could predict BCN will be successfull from BEG.
DeleteWas one of those 200k and never again.
ReplyDeleteOverblown city for no reason, but us Serbians love that apparently.
Yes it's just the Serbs. Barcelona is one of the most visited cities in the world. Must have been because of the Serbs.
Delete50+ million pax/year by air alone...
Delete