New EI base - London Gatwick

alpha2zulu

Its been confirmed that from April, Aer Lingus will base 4 A320's at LGW, flying to Dublin (Existing Route), Knock, Malaga, Munich, Nice ,Vienna, Faro and Zurich. Based fleet will rise to 8 over the following 12 months and up to 2.5 million passengers a year.

Have to say very ballsy move in the current climate. Given that the UK economy will recover faster than here in Ireland, it makes sense to reduce exposure to the Irish market.
Best of luck EI:D

Fratton Fred

with the sell off of gatwick looming, that could be very good indeed. There is a new runway planned (Subject to a planning enquiry) and if that goes ahead, Gatwick could become a very large airport.

it is the largest single runway operation in the world btw.

Have EI started routes to London City as well? I saw it on their website earlier.

alpha2zulu

Have EI started routes to London City as well? I saw it on their website earlier

No, the flights arent operated by EI themselves. It's a codeshare with the British Airways 3 times daily service to LCY.

WexCan

Very interesting move by Aer Lingus, into a market where they aren't hugely well known and where easyJet and British Airways rule the roost.

Route choice is interesting.

Dublin - British Airways pulling out this summer, 6 daily against Ryanair's similar offering, will likely draw many of the BA passengers as will be the only choice for connections from/to longhaul flights and I imagine will be operated as a codeshare with BA.

Knock - Very few have been able to make a success of this route. In recent years, easyJet tried, and was quickly chased away by Ryanair, who left as quickly as they came. XL had a go but by all accounts loads were consistently low. Perhaps Aer Lingus will be able to turn it around.

Zurich - Being dropped by BA, no competition from Gatwick.

Nice - easyJet well established with good loads. BA similar.

Malaga/Faro - easyJet has lion's share of the market, BA also in strong position, also competition from charters. Will have to be seen if demand will be high enough.

Vienna - No competition from Gatwick.

Munich - No competition from Gatwick.

All in all, a good selection, apart from (possibly) Malaga or Faro where yields will likely be quite low. Knock is 50/50 really. Of course, some may opt to fly to Heathrow instead on dropped BA routes.

easyJet will be difficult on the Malaga/Faro/Nice. They are very well established on these routes and repeat business is very high, as are loads. For the Malaga and Faro especially, the "average" passenger will be very price sensitive which could cause yields to suffer.

Aer Lingus will have to do a hell of a good advertising job to stimulate demand - while British passengers are happy to fly with an Irish airline, take Ryanair for example, it will seem odd to some to travel from south east England to the likes of the Algarve, Costa del Sol, Germany etc in a green airplane. I can see it now: "Eh mate, they've gone and painted it wrong, it's A-I-R! And what's with the Lingus - sounds dirty..."

I do hope they make a success out of it though, they'll be getting an application from me anyway.

Tenger

Deleted at Tengers request by Mod

alpha2zulu

Just reading on one of the "other" sites that EI has signed a 6month 800k deal to be the flagship sponsors of the Capital Radio breakfast show with Johnny Vaughan from March. While hes no Chris Moyles,he does pull in 800,000 listeners a day,so should work nicely for them.

The current sponsors are easyjet:D

Gonna be very interesting to see how the operation is going 12months from now.

Fratton Fred

alpha2zulu wrote: »

Just reading on one of the "other" sites that EI has signed a 6month 800k deal to be the flagship sponsors of the Capital Radio breakfast show with Johnny Vaughan from March. While hes no Chris Moyles,he does pull in 800,000 listeners a day,so should work nicely for them.

The current sponsors are easyjet:D

Gonna be very interesting to see how the operation is going 12months from now.

Hey, that's great. I listen to the show, maybe i could win a free flight to err Dublin :D