NEWS FLASH
Air Serbia carried 548.009 passengers in July 2024, representing an increase of 7.2% on the same month in 2023. It represents the carrier’s busiest July since rebranding in 2013. Maintaining a total of 5.203 flights during the month, its number of operations increased 6.8%. During the January - July period, the airline carried 2.427.811 travellers, up 9.3% on 2023 and is now on course to overtake its predecessor JAT Yugoslav Airlines’ annual record achieved in 1987 The most popular destinations within Air Serbia’s network during the month were Valencia, Malaga and Palma de Mallorca in Western Europe, Larnaca, Heraklion, Istanbul, Izmir, Corfu and Rhodes in the Euro-Mediterranean region, while there was strong demand for flights to Tianjin in the long haul sector.
Commenting on the results, Air Serbia’s General Manager for Commercial and Strategy, Boško Rupić, said, “Considering that by June of last year we had expanded our network with the addition of over twenty new destinations, July 2023 was a record month so far in terms of the number of passengers carried and flights operated. This year, we have exceeded that result, which is a clear indicator that the choice of destinations was good and that passengers need to have greater choice when travelling. In the first seven months of 2024, we carried 2.427.811 passengers on scheduled and charter flights, which is a 9.26% increase year-over-year”. Mr Rupić added, “Charter traffic saw a slightly lower number of passengers and flights compared to the same month last year, primarily due to reduced passenger interest in certain charter destinations, caused by current geopolitical events, as well as the wider offer of destinations in our scheduled operations”.
It's amazing how Spain overtook Greece. Now certain Greek airports will only have a dozen rotations this entire season.
ReplyDeleteSpain is cheaper than Greece. Greece is to expensive this year
DeleteAccording to the link below, 1.5 million Serbs are expected to travel abroad for holidays this year. A million of them will go to Greece which is the most popular destination followed by Turkey, Egypt and Tunisia.
Delete2/3 of Serbs that go to Greece head to the northern parts probably because they take the car or a bus.
According to him, around 70.000 Serbs are going to visit Spain this year.
More info can be found here. This was published in June so we will have definite numbers in September, October.
https://n1info.rs/magazin/lifestyle/leto-2024-aranzmani-grcka-turska-crna-gora-spanija-hrvatska-tunis/
It's because >95% of people who go to Greece go by car.
DeleteJust because Spain overtook Greece does not mean Serbs are flying there. JU is a network carrier
DeleteSpain busiest? What… thought we were poor..
ReplyDeleteForgot to mention.. greetings from alicante, beautiful area!
DeleteOf course we are poor! Analiticar insist that we are 4th poorest in Europe. ANALiticar znae!
DeleteNot saying Serbs are poor but you can get pretty decent prices all over Spain.
DeleteIt can't be more popular than Montenegro. However, I was shocked to hear so much Serbian in Malaga. Especially in the shopping areas.
DeleteI heard also a lot of Serbian in northern Italy this year. We have too admit that we have now a higher lizing standard in Serbia and first of all Belgrade. In 5-7 years we will see charters all over the globe and also sobe winter destinations like Thailand, Maledives, Zanzibar...
DeleteMy guess is when it comes to northern Italy, Wizz air is responsible for that. Their BGY flights are very affordable and their average load on this route was over 90%. Before they decimated their network out of BEG, they planned on increasing Bergamo.
DeleteAnon 12.51
DeleteI don't think Montenegro is that popular in Serbia. Don't forget that many Montenegrins live in Belgrade so they are the ones who stimulate all this demand between BEG and TGD/TIV.
I noticed Rovinj is extremely popular this year which makes sense since Istra is safe for Serbs. Makes you wonder if Wizz Air could try BEG-PUY at least on a summer seasonal basis. I think in the future Wizz Air will have to put greater focus on leisure routes.
I have a feeling they will either launch MAD or AGP in 2025.
"Safe for Serbs" - unlike the rest of Croatia obviously, just wondering why are there so many seasonal JU flights to literally all coastal airports of Dalmatia too
DeleteI don't think Wizz will start MAD or AGP because JU is pretty strong there, it would make more sense to start Alicante, Seville and Ibiza in Spain, and maybe Faro in Portugal.
DeleteIn Greece they might start some island as well as Athens.
In Italy they might start Lamezia Terme.
But yes, Wizz will definitely have to focus now on leisure routes from Belgrade since most of P2P are already covered.
Anon 16.29
DeleteMaybe because there are Serbs in Croatia and their family in Serbia that visit each other plus JU times their flights in such a way so as to offer connections in both directions. Anyway, only DBV is daily for like 2.5 months and the route is operated by the Atr. SPU is 6 weekly.
There is a reason why only PUY has such times that perfectly suit O&D travelers.
Anon 16.31
DeleteWell, we can't really say that JU is strong in AGP with just two weekly flights. Also they planned on increasing it to three before they had fleet issues. Demand is definitely there and it seems to be growing.
Also don't forget that Wizz Air launched BCN when there was far more competition than there is to AGP.
Would be nice if they introduced Tenerife from BEG.
'Zanimljiva destinacija je i Hrvatska, ali se u tu zemlju putuje individualno jer tu nemamo organizovanih grupa. Tokom letnje sezone u Hrvatskoj boravi nekoliko desetina hiljada građana Srbije, najveći broj njih već standardno letuje u Istri“, objašnjava Seničić.'
Deletehttps://n1info.rs/magazin/lifestyle/leto-2024-aranzmani-grcka-turska-crna-gora-spanija-hrvatska-tunis/
Oh please, Croatia is safe for Serbs in general, Nemjee. Stop insinuating otherwise and stop with the politics.
DeleteRead the TOS of this website at least.
I am merely stating and reporting facts. According to the link above there are going to be over 1.500.000 Serbs who will travel abroad this summer for holidays. Top destinations are Greece, Turkey, Tunisia and Spain. The same article reported that Croatia is not a top choice while those that do go there up in Istra (and there is a very good reason for that).
DeleteIt is for that exact reason why JU's flight to PUY leaves BEG at 07.40, 13.10 and 09.40.
Furthermore, Serbian outbound tourism has been growing over the years and from what I remember last year we broke all records when it came to charter traffic. There is a reason why some markets grow faster than others and why Serbs decide not to go to certain countries.
As mentioned earlier, I am merely stating facts. You on the other hand have presented none.
Fear for safety, and I will not go into a debate whether it is justified or not, is probably the most important reason why Serbs dont go to Croatia in larger numbers.
DeleteI have been going to Croatia for the past three years, but mostly to Istria. In Split I had several uncomfortable situations, so why risk having my car scratched or otherwise damaged when I can just go to Rovinj and enjoy the beauties there
Indeed, plus in the past Croatia has invested a lot into advertizing itself in Serbia, including the Advent in Zagreb. Istra did the same and it seems to have only worked out for them which isn't all too surprising. Heck even OU put billboards around Belgrade in order to promote their SPU route. One of the billboards was in front of JU's HQ. Eventually this route which exclusively relied on O&D failed.
DeleteAlso, wasn't PUY the first Croatian destination JU resumed? Hopefully they add more flights next year as the ones they have this year are almost sold out.
It was DBV but then Croatian government banned them the next year. When HR entered EU they could not do it anymore.
DeleteThat means that BEG is well over million
ReplyDeleteProbably not since these numbers include Nis and Kraljevo operations. With that in mind, somewhere around 530.000 goes to Belgrade. Belgrade should be somewhere around 950.000 this month.
DeleteI can confirm BEG is seven figures in july
DeleteIf that's the case then it means certain foreign carriers performed exceptionally well. We all know that we can't count on Wizz Air until September.
DeleteBut how BEG will have over a million passengersc? In a previous article ex-yu said that BEG scheduled seat capacity for july is 983.929 ! Since charter is not so strong this month , does this mean all airlines in every flight had 100% LF ???
Delete^ you realize other airlines operate charters too? Nouveilair alone has 10 flights per week to BEG.
DeleteHow is it possible that routes with two weekly flights are the busiest, maybe in terms of LF?
ReplyDeleteOn purpose they are not mentioning that Moscow and St Peterburg are the busiest with +95% LF. Not to mention their profitability on flights to Russia as tickets are sold at ripoff prices (by all airlines).
DeleteAnon 12:05 AS flies 26 weekly flights to Spain, go figure how it's possible. And 28 weekly to Russia including Kazan, I guess LF is higher to BCN, Mallorca and Malaga then to Kazan these days Anon 12:18.
DeleteAlso don't forget that when it comes to Spain, most flights are operated by A320/738. As for Russia, a large number of flights are on the A319.
DeleteFrom the top of my head, Madrid is almost exclusively operated by A320/738 this summer.
Excellent results! And nice pic too :)
ReplyDeleteDemand to LCA was crazy this summer. Both JU and W6 were forced to add extra capacity last minute. JU eventually added a 10.20 departure on Wednesdays (after cutting Wednesdays at 17.00) while Wizz Air added a morning flight on Mondays with a LCA based A321.
ReplyDeleteI hope that in summer we finally get 21 weekly flights with JU and W6.
Which geopolitical events caused charter decline? Were there any Israel charters?
ReplyDeleteMany have cancelled trips to Egypt because of war in Gaza.
DeleteWould love to see some statistics on Serbian tourists in Tunisia because I think this year many went there. Nouvelair has quite a presence in BEG and I think they took some passengers that used to fly on JU charters in the past.
DeleteAir Serbia simply did not have enough planes to meet this demand. Based on flights from BEG I'd say traditional destinations in Egypt are not as popular as they once were. MUH seems to be doing really well. A few weeks ago I saw two A319s flying there at pretty much the same time.
Great to see Spain getting good numbers after finally being discovered by Serbian holidaymakers, though there's no way it can be busier than Turkey?
ReplyDelete