NEWS FLASH
Air Serbia has adjusted its Belgrade - Naples operations for the remainder of the winter season. The carrier will place the route on hiatus from January 9, briefly reinstating services between February 13 and 20 to cater for increased demand during the holiday period in Serbia. Flights will then be suspended again until March 30. Originally, Air Serbia intended to operate the service throughout the entire winter, prior to making schedule changes last week. Last year, the route was maintained solely on a seasonal summer basis. This winter, services on the route are primarily being maintained by a wet-leased Bulgaria Air Embraer E190.
Grrr they are really having trouble decreasing seasonality
ReplyDeleteBut they have. They operate this route 3 months longer than last year.
DeleteI really do not know how they plan routes. You can not fly directly from Scandinavia to Naples whole winter season, and they put whole winter season from Belgrade in the beginning.
DeleteWhy is this route not operated with ATR during winter?
ReplyDeleteThe ATR could do it, but probably the demand and yield is not strong enough.
DeletePlus if Air Serbia is slightly short on crews it doesn't help.
Something's off with that strategy, because they loaded the exact same summer capacity for the winter, 2x weekly on Bulgaria Air E90. Obviously that wasn't economical at all.
DeleteWe can look at the example of Bari and see how the route develops when it is served by turboprop aircraft, and Naples is no different market.
Hopefully easyJet launches NAP-BEG
DeleteNaples Airport gives preferential treatment to larger commercial jets and often do not issue slots for regional turboprops, even in winter.
DeleteShame. A wonderful city, and ideal for a long city break (the Friday - Monday) schedules are great. Furthermore, a great value, much cheaper than Belgrade, not sure why Serbian tourists haven't embraced it more. Also, Air Serbia should promote Belgrade in Naples more.
ReplyDeleteThey seem to have embraced it. But few people go on holidays from mid January to mid February.
DeleteThey go to Alps (no Salzburg and Grenoble by JU), Blgaria, and exYU mountains.
DeletePeople like taking city break holidays when the tickets are cheap. Few people want to pay JU prices for frivolous city breaks.
DeleteI am based in Nis, and the vast majority of people from this part of the country fly from Sofia exclusively for this types of trips. You can always find Italy or Spain for 50eur return except at the very peak of the season
Just checked JU prices for February, the cheapest is almost 300eur return, and most dates it's over 500. It's a joke
DeleteAs long as you keep on flying from Sofia you won't have more flights from INI
Delete@14.21 because the flights are full. That's why they are expensive and they are operated during holidays and most people have booked flights and tour operators also have seats booked.
Delete@14:50
DeleteThat makes no sense. I fly from INI when flights are available. but between BEG and SOF I choose SOF most of the time
Of course February is expensive. It is during national holiday and school holiday. The left those flights because they are full.
DeleteIt's not just February. 95% of the time flights from BEG are significantly more expensive than from SOF. Which makes sense given that SOF is a much more competitive market, whch benefits consumers
DeleteSOF has more competitive market that benefits consumers, that's what the theory says. But in practice, SOF was ahead of BEG in terms of annual passengers, but now it's the other way around.
DeleteCouldn't be less relevant who handles more pax from a passenger's point of view/
DeleteExactly. It’s not s theory, SOF is more competitive and for most destinations consumers get better value for money then flying out of BEG. There are exceptions, I believe beg has more Lh group frequencies and sometimes better prices. But for direct LCC flights Sofia has a much better offering while still being well connected with legacy carriers.
DeleteWhat competitive market? We all know Tuzla low prices are NOT a result of competitive market that benefits consumers. We all know what fuels Ryan growth in SJJ or what has been helping W6 in SKP.
DeleteIf you want more flights from INI, shop early and support local economy. INI had flights to Milan but some passengers didn't want to pay a couple of EUR more for convenience of having a flight from a local airport. Work on that first.
SOF is an airport outside of this blog's geofenced area of interest, and this article is about JU schedule changes.
Why are you so triggered by the fact that SOF is a more competitive market than BEG?
DeleteI couldn't care less about SOF. Someone else was triggered by JU pricing. BEG has more passengers than SOF and it is within EX-YU, unlike SOF. Idemo dalje.
DeleteHow is SOF more competitive than BEG? I might be wrong but BEG has a larger network and more planes which are based there. Not to mention that BEG has long-haul flights while SOF doesn't.
DeleteSOF might be cheaper to fly out and that is ok. Every airport adapts to the market it serves. BEG can obviously handle more passengers with higher charges, even with Wizz Air.
If you think it's normal to fly around Europe for €20 then you are very wrong. There is a reason why airports fight so much with Ryanair. They can offer cheap fares because they pay next to nothing to the airport.
Btw I tried to find SOF's financial report and I can't. On the other hand, BEG returned to profitability after years of large investments. I flew LCA-BEG the other day and upon landing I saw that they actually started working on the terminal expansion. Compared to SOF, BEG is much more proactive when it comes to investments and airport development.
ATR is the way to go.
ReplyDeleteSo fancy headline for canceled flights
ReplyDeleteThe route has not been cancelled. Instead, it will be paused during select weeks this winter and will operate during certain periods, unlike last year. Therefore, a headline indicating that the airline is scaling back its initially planned winter operations is accurate and reflects the content. While this information has not been reported elsewhere, I am pleased that readers can obtain the full context here on EX-YU Aviation News, even if the headline may not align with everyone’s preference.
DeleteVery well said, EX-YU Aviation. Thank you.
DeleteWell these are effectively massive cancellations of flights. JU should really do better planning of there schedule. They are massively interrupting plans for people relying on their scheduled flights between Belgrade and Italy.
ReplyDeleteIf they cancel a flight because of low demand during dead period of the year I doubt they have interrupted many plans.
DeleteAnon 18:19 Editor literally explained they are not cancelled. Vrapche school of aviation keeps trying?
DeleteMy flight got cancelled and I got email from Air Serbia. So yes, the flights are cancelled for some time during winter since they have been scheduled and put on sale. The route is not cancelled.
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