Air Serbia handled just over 20.000 passengers on its Belgrade - Shanghai service during the first six months of operations. “Flights between the Serbian capital and China’s business hub have maintained a high load factor, with growing interest that has further intensified during the summer season”, the airline said. Although it did not disclose the exact figure, with 27.800 seats available on the route over the six-month period, the average load factor is estimated at just over 72%. Since launching the service on January 11, Air Serbia has maintained two weekly flights between Belgrade and Shanghai, in addition to its two weekly operations to Guangzhou.
Commenting on the carrier’s performance, Air Serbia’s CEO, Jiri Marek, said, “The commencement of scheduled flights between Belgrade and Shanghai marked an important step in our initiative aimed at enhancing Serbia’s global connectivity. The number of passengers who have used this route over the past six months clearly confirms its justification and strategic importance. In doing so, we have facilitated travel between the two countries and contributed to strengthening economic and cultural exchange between Serbia and the People’s Republic of China. We are confident that the importance of this route will continue to grow in the years to come, in line with trends in cooperation between Europe and Asia”.
Air Serbia is one of only eight European carriers currently operating flights between Europe and China. The airline recently secured permits to launch services to Beijing but has indicated that its immediate priority is to increase frequencies on existing routes to China. Prior to the route's introduction, Shanghai was Belgrade Airport’s busiest unserved long-haul destination, while the Serbian capital ranked among Shanghai’s busiest unserved European cities. Between January and May, Serbia welcomed 66.645 visitors from China, marking a 41.9% year-on-year increase, or an additional 19.668 arrivals.
Bravo Air Serbia 🇷🇸🇷🇸🇷🇸
ReplyDeleteBravo JU
DeleteWhich city in China is now the busiest unserved from BEG?
ReplyDeleteMost likely Beijing
DeleteBeijing is served from Belgrade by Hainan Airlines.
DeleteOh yes sorry about that i mis read it i thought asking busiest unserved with Air Serbia. You're right, thanks for correcting me! My apologies
DeleteHangzhou and Chengdu based on indirect travel. However, it is important to note that the numbers for these two cities are nowhere near to the figures that were previously recorded by Shanghai, Guangzhou and Beijing, which were the three busiest unserved destinations in China before their launch.
DeleteThank you! Was not expecting those two. It might explain why JU is not looking to add anymore destinations in China (except for maybe PEK).
DeleteWhat airport is the busiest unserved from Belgrade based on indirect travel?
DeleteOverall or in China?
DeleteOverall
DeleteProbably Toronto.
DeleteManchester maybe?
DeleteToronto is currently the busiest unserved route.
DeleteIt is important to note that one of the factors for YYZ being so large is that AC/Porter use it as a hub for most other Canadian towns to transfer to Europe. Westjet uses Halifax and St. John's to fly to Europe at a much cheaper rate. Not all cities in Canada have regular flights to Europe/US. I just flew from YWG to Amsterdam via Halifax and caught the JU flight to BEG for $1,000 CAD less than with the AC/Star alliance. There are a lot of other factors involved with the numbers to be sure (i.e. visas for most Ex-Yu passport holders), but that is for another discussion.
Delete@admin I thought I'd be interesting to publish an article listing and analysing the top 5 or 10 unserved airports globally :)
Delete@admin How many passengers travelled indirectly from chengdu and hangzhou to belgrade?
DeleteHopefully Beijing is next, but I agree with the strategy to first grow existing routes.
ReplyDeleteI hope they don't launch Beijing. There is already Hainan flying on the route so JU should focus on consolidating their presence on the markets they already serve: CAN and PVG.
DeleteNemjee09:07 There is China Southern is flying to Guangzhou yet AS still does it.
DeleteVery good result but they need to work hard on densifying their network. And no, I am not referring to their statements and intentions of doing so, I mean them actually doing it. They made some progress but their core Western European presence is still relatively modest, especially for a hub airline. This will be extremely important in being competitive in markets such as Shanghai.
ReplyDeleteFor example, their LCA flights are doing really well exactly because they boosted it to 14 weekly. Last night the A319 departed with 112 passengers out of which were 29 from BCN, 21 from LIS, 8 from NAP... Return flight has 127 passengers.
Due to daytime flights from BEG, most of O&D has shifted from the night flights leaving more room to transfer passengers. These will be key going forward.
Same with PVG. If the route is performing well then they must make sure they keep on adding frequencies. Especially while the rest of the European airlines are struggling in China.
Well, 112 pax to a seaside destination in july is not that good. And if those are mainly transfers, I believe it is a money burner.
DeleteThank you for the insights Nemjee. Must be really nice having access to such information.
DeleteAnonymous expert at @9.14 has spoken 😂
DeleteAnon 09.14
DeleteYou can't look at a route's profitability based on the number of passengers alone. What is key here is the yield and that is based on the average fare that is paid by passengers. Since JU is keeping these night flights then it can only mean they are making enough money on them. Not to mention that these night flights are key for their overall connectivity.
Also, both flights had business class passengers which helped with their yield. Configuration on both flights was less than 144 due to business class passengers, it was most likely 136.
As already mentioned, post-covid JU introduced daytime flights to LCA. O&D demand migrated to these flights while leaving more room for transfers on the night ones.
Just because transfer passengers tend to be lower yielding, doesn't mean they are loss-making. Just ask Turkish Airlines, Emirates, Qatar Airways, Icelandair etc.
Mario, you are welcome. These are not difficult to find if you know someone at the airport. I only asked because some family members flew to LCA. I wanted to know where the transfers were coming from to see if there is going to be a delay.
DeleteLuckily JU operations have considerably improved so everything arrived on time, even the chaotic BCN which tends to be late.
These are not good figures. They are not really making money on those transfer passengers. Maybe we don't need these midnight flights to Larnaca. I took afternoon flights this June to Larnaca and they were packed with locals going to holiday.
DeleteLast weekend I flew Podgorica-Belgrade. My return ticket was well over 200eur.
DeleteMy colleague on the other hand flew to Zurich via Belgrade for just over 85eur. Half of the flight were transfers but really they are not.making money if they are selling sectors for under 50eur in middle of July. They do make money but on us flying directly.
Maybe we do, maybe we don't. Obviously Air Serbia has done its homework and realized that those flights make them money. After all, Air Serbia is not known to keep underperforming routes.
DeleteAnyway, it was reported here that transfer passengers make up roughly 40% of their total traffic. Given their solid financial results one can only assume they are making money off of them. I just don't see a single valid argument to prove otherwise.
- JU is putting a bigger focus on transfers
- JU is a profitable business
When you put 2 and 2 together you get 4. Not 5 which is what your comments do.
Anon 10.37
DeleteWhile completely ignoring the return flight which 127/136 passengers which is a LF of 93%.
@10.37 your way of thinking is so wrong. How do you know the return sector was not full? Stop making dumb conclusions based on no data. If it was not profitable they would not operate it.
DeleteI understnad him. He is unhappy with today's news after probably advocating that this route would be a disaster. Unable to find something to complain about he latched onto this. It is typical. Just ignore it. When they are ignored it kills them.
DeleteIt is illegal to reveal flight stats outside official channels @Nemjee
DeleteI just called the police
Delete@12:35
DeleteSo if I am a passenger I am not allowed to tell anybody about the load? Funny!
hahahaha of course it's not illegal.
DeleteGreetings from BEG
I agree completely. The cargo numbers also have a huge impact on profitability. I imagine TEMO alone takes up 90% of the cargo going to BEG and Rakija taking up 90% of the cargo going to China.
DeleteAlso, keep in mind: 1) having more transfer passengers allows an airline to keep a denser schedule / more frequencies. More frequencies are key to capturing higher yield pax. Many categories of pax will pay a substantially higher fare if it means the "correct" time slot, and what that means is highly individual. (Not just business passengers, also families with small children, people with a scarcity of days off work etc.) 2) night time utilization of aircraft is super important for profitability. The aircraft are otherwise just sitting parked on the ground. Better to operate the flight even if your margins are low (as long as the net contribution is at all positive)
DeletePretty good result for a new long haul route.
ReplyDeleteEspecially when you add significant volume of cargo
DeleteIdemo dalje...
ReplyDeleteBoth China routes are doing great, Guangzhou was packed during winter and spring months...Nevertheless, JU needs to open more routes in order to utilize 4 aircraft..This should be done before winter...They must be waiting for approval from Chinese authorities for adding more flights to Shanghai..As to my knowledge, for Guangzhou they had already been approved 3...Lets see, so far they were quit quick and proactive in short haul routes, off course long haul requires much more thorough investifation, but the time is leaking...4. plane was acquired 6 months ago..
ReplyDeleteIncreasing frequencies on both PVG and CAN is a must.
DeleteAlso they now have more than enough spare capacity to launch YYZ. Just paying monthly leases for widebody aircraft and not fully utilizing them is the wrong strategy.
There are only 3 available widebodies so far. No rush
DeleteLong haul routes also require much more investment. Only three widebodies were in the fleet for the past two months and all three were being fully utilised.
DeleteBeijing and Miami, are coming in winter, YYZ in next summer.
DeleteMiami is not coming in winter. The CEO said himself. No need to make things up.
DeleteThe CEO never said Miami is not coming in winter. He said Miami will be the next destination without giving a date.
DeleteHe said maybe this year, maybe next year. But I think it would be great to start on November or early December to catch Christmas/New Year season. Like they started Shanghai early January to catch Lunar New Year season
DeleteGreat to hear such a good news! I hope the LF would increase a bit in a coming period and that they'll add some additional frequencies.
ReplyDeleteGreat news
ReplyDeleteBravo AirSerbia
I am relatively new on this site and it is becoming my favourite, one of the sites that i open first every morning.
Other potential routes?
ReplyDelete