Beijing21 From Switzerland, joined Nov 2004, 83 posts, RR: 0 Posted (8 years 4 months 2 weeks 5 days 11 hours ago) and read 2664 times:
Easy jet, Emirates, Etihad, Continental and at some extent MEA have invested a lot of money in developping services all year round to GVA. With successes so far...
Will swiss ever react to these competitors considering the high yield the pax out of GVA represent ?
My point of view is that swiss has not the capabilities to get back on track in western Swizerland because of lack of equipement and its strategy remains to cheer up Zurich services. Therefore only partners could establish new routes but who will. Likely AA ?
I can't believe swiss continue to increase frerquencies on their shuttle route GVA-ZRH. At the moment swiss withdrawes direct services from GVA why the hell would I be agree to transit via ZRH instead of FRA, CDG, LHR... at highest fares ?
PPVRA From Brazil, joined Nov 2004, 8492 posts, RR: 43 Reply 1, posted (8 years 4 months 2 weeks 5 days 11 hours ago) and read 2610 times:
Easy jet, Emirates, Etihad, Continental and at some extent MEA have invested a lot of money in developping services all year round to GVA. With successes so far...
RG *might* begin services to Japan through GVA.
At the moment swiss withdrawes direct services from GVA why the hell would I be agree to transit via ZRH instead of FRA, CDG, LHR... at highest fares ?
Why would they do that? did they say they would do it or did it already happen? They can always codeshare out of GVA...
Cheers,
PPVRA
[Edited 2005-01-03 23:37:12]
"If goods do not cross borders, soldiers will" - Frederic Bastiat
LX23 From United Kingdom, joined Aug 2004, 347 posts, RR: 3 Reply 2, posted (8 years 4 months 2 weeks 5 days 10 hours ago) and read 2570 times:
Beijing:
As you know from earlier posts about GVA, I continually rant and rave about LX's mismanagement of GVA ops, so i'll make the answer short for simplicity's sake: no. Unfortunately, they simply can't seem to think of anything but a ZRH-centric approach to the airline.
PPVRA: LX has cut many services ex-GVA, even though some of those routes were amongst the most profitable the airline had (they even talked about dropping the JFK route, which was the only transatlantic route left ex-GVA and is traditionally their best route in terms of money made). It's been happening for a long while now, and what you are beginning to see are more and more people preferring to travel via CDG, FRA, or LHR rather than have to go to ZRH. Just as a bit of info, last year, more than 600,000 pax had to take the GVA-ZRH shuttle to make connections. Couple this with the amount of daily flights other airlines have to GVA from other hubs which carry connecting pax, and you'll see why I say LX management is mismanaging GVA
INNflight From Austria, joined Apr 2004, 3765 posts, RR: 62 Reply 5, posted (8 years 4 months 2 weeks 4 days 22 hours ago) and read 2412 times:
I travelled through GVA twice this summer ( once LX, once EZY Switzerland ) and have to agree. Swiss offers around 4-6 daily flights on the ZRH-GVA routing, with A320 family aircraft. On my flight it was an A321, with 26 (!!!) passengers on it. I think LX would do fine with 3 or 4 connections, but at the moment it's too much on the ZRH-GVA route!!!
They should focus on routes from GVA to other European hubs instead...
BTW: Dropping the GVA-JFK flights would be the most stupid thing ever! It's the "United Nations shuttle" between GVA and JFK and has TONS of business travellers. If they drop this route they could leave GVA anyway and focus on ZRH.
RJ100 From Russia, joined Nov 2000, 4107 posts, RR: 33 Reply 8, posted (8 years 4 months 2 weeks 4 days 21 hours ago) and read 2349 times:
I don't think it is important which city is better in terms of business pax. Swiss unfortunately has never understood that there are several regions in Switzerland that need air connections. There is not just one region that deserves air traffic. Even BRN would have sufficient demand for some routes but Swiss is just not interested.
ZRH the most important city in Switzerland? Maybe. But if you look where the economical growth in recent years took place you'll end up in northwestern Switzerland (BSL) and in the lac Léman region (GVA).
Lxsaab2000 From Switzerland, joined Feb 2004, 325 posts, RR: 1 Reply 9, posted (8 years 4 months 2 weeks 4 days 21 hours ago) and read 2314 times:
RJ100 : The mine was only a question as I don't know very well the Switzerland's regional economies.
By the way I'm agree with you. I think Switzerland needs many flights from all the most important cities and regions. I remember in the past years when Swissair/Crossair (and then Swiss during the 1st year of operations) guaranteed a lot of flights from all swiss airports : GVA , BSL , ZRH and also LUG and BRN.
Now Swiss doesn't have unfortunately the same possibilities and "abilities" as the glorious SR had , and so probably , in order to reduce their costs , they've decided (right or wrong) to concentrate most of their flights in ZRH.
Probably at the moment the best solution for Switzerland's aviation should be to have many strong swiss carriers with operations mainly out of GVA and BSL to replace the LX' s lack. Look at Darwin Airline in Lugano for example.
Ezycrew From Spain, joined Oct 2001, 460 posts, RR: 4 Reply 10, posted (8 years 4 months 2 weeks 4 days 19 hours ago) and read 2268 times:
Crossair, by setting up a major base at GVA, understood the importance of non-hub, point-to-point, high-yield service.
Since Swiss has been totally "Swissair-ized" last year, the base was closed, French-speakers furloughed (only 8 of the 100+ ex LX/GVA f/a's are left, I'm one of them) and we lost our precious LHR slots to management incompetence.
Flight out of GVA are now operated EXCLUSIVELY by ZRH-based crews (with paid hotels and allowances, thus increasing the cost of GVA flights).
The decision by Swiss to maximize ressources at ZRH, is mainly due to that region (the city, canton) investing into the airline when it was launched, and due to an almost exclusive Swiss-German administration board. These adminisrators wouldn't want their political carreers jeopardized by eliminating jobs in Swiss-Germany, would they?
At least here in GVA, we're not that worried of an eventual LX failure. They are becoming a minor player, and we French speakers are receiving better service by Air France (with it's shuttle to Paris and unlimited connections to the world) and easyJet Switzerland, which is now GVA #1 airline with a 27% share.
RJ100 From Russia, joined Nov 2000, 4107 posts, RR: 33 Reply 11, posted (8 years 4 months 2 weeks 4 days 19 hours ago) and read 2222 times:
Hi LXSaab2000:
My answer was meant to be just an information. Sorry if it sounded aggressive towards you, it was not my intention.
But back to the question. Swiss in GVA will in my opinion not expand services in the longhaul sector. Like Ezycrew already said, crews are based in ZRH and aircraft are too. Every longhaul flight out of GVA therefore must operate with ZRH crew which is more expensive because of hotel costs. etc. And every pax in GVA is one less in ZRH so Swiss will never compete with its own ZRH hub.
I have nothing against concentrating traffic at one point. Economically it would make sense. But if you are using a name for your company like "Swiss", then it means that you serve all regions of that country well.
JoFMO From Germany, joined Jul 2004, 2211 posts, RR: 0 Reply 12, posted (8 years 4 months 2 weeks 4 days 18 hours ago) and read 2191 times:
GVA is popular with middle eastern carriers and passengers. But they have a hub at one side and can offer connections. Every Swiss flight form GVA is only point-to-point. Therefore middle eastern carriers have an advantage against Swiss.
From my perspective it sometimes seems that people in Switzerland sometimes expect a little bit too much of Swiss. There are bigger countries in Europe and bigger carriers who only can maintain one international hub.
Switzerland is too small for two significant long haul bases.
Beijing21 From Switzerland, joined Nov 2004, 83 posts, RR: 0 Reply 14, posted (8 years 4 months 2 weeks 4 days 13 hours ago) and read 2073 times:
Well, as for me GVA is a very good example of niche market that has indeed a high yield pax figures, it occurs to me that we'll see in the future companies from overseas using the opportunity to develop here.
How ?
1) By loading pax on their flights to their hubs. ( EK will do so )
2) With appropriate aircraft equipment... A330, 7e7, A350 may be very successful on some routes
3) With a durable presence here. Time to esablish good reputation and exposure takes time.
In the future I see the following airlines coming here :
Air Canada to YUL
Qatar Airways to DOH
American to ORD or BOS
A chinese airline ( the new visa policy allowes people to travel freely to Switzerland under certain conditions )
And a few others to change their routes : Using more 5th freedom rights.
What do you think about these prospects ??? What did I forget or mishandle here ???
Ezycrew From Spain, joined Oct 2001, 460 posts, RR: 4 Reply 15, posted (8 years 4 months 2 weeks 4 days 12 hours ago) and read 2047 times:
AC to YUL has long been rumoured... with a daily 333 until they get a few 319's reconfigured for intercontinental services. http://www.dpts.org/news.html
As for QR, since EY is already here and EK will have a daily flight to DXB later this year, the market to that region will soon start to be pretty saturated. Add these to KU to KWI and SV to RUH/JED, ME to BEY, RJ to AMM and IR to THR, and it's easy to see that this market is a bit full.
And QR has services from ZRH, which is easily reachable by train or car from anywhere in "Suisse Romande".
Also remember that GF tried several times to turn a profit in GVA, and failed miserably everytime.
With EK offering excellent connections throughout Asia, I doubt a chinese airline would want to add GVA to its timetable, especially considering their general low level of service (with the exception of CX), which do not fit the local expectations for excellence (that's also what makes GVA a very high yield origin).
Beijing21 From Switzerland, joined Nov 2004, 83 posts, RR: 0 Reply 16, posted (8 years 4 months 2 weeks 4 days 12 hours ago) and read 2025 times:
What about a new service to the US then... An premium service like Privat air to D.C. or simply an AA 762 to one of their hub. Wouldn't it be logic as LX and AA have a transatlantic alliance.
With QR I do agree with you. Just that the Swiss travel mag travelinisde stated recently ( I don't remember the issue, sorry for the source ) 2 points.
1) They haven't given up their plans to launch GVA
2) Thay don't charge for now on the connecting flight to ZRH.
So it's still open somehow. BUT I do agree with you
I would see them to use an A332 to NYC via GVA. That could be profitable though.
Didn't know about the quality of mainland chinese airlines...
Ezycrew From Spain, joined Oct 2001, 460 posts, RR: 4 Reply 17, posted (8 years 4 months 2 weeks 4 days 11 hours ago) and read 2013 times:
I agree that a 763 service by AA to ORD would be nice.... however it's O&D traffic that earns the most cash, and I am not sure how much such traffic the route could support. And with the nightmare of connecting through the USA right now, pax would prefer to use direct services (to LAX, SFO, SEA etc...) from a European hub than have to transit through ORD.
However, a PrivatAir service to ORD would be cool, and I wish Swiss would support that option. I don't know how sales of the ZRH-EWR service is doing, but maybe that if demand is strong enough they'll try that from GVA, or even BSL (BSL-EWR).
If QR was to operate to GVA, I would rather see an operation pretty much like DOH-ZRH, with a narrowbody Airbus.
And yes, mainland Chinese airlines leave alot to be desired in terms of service, and until the late 90's, safety. They are improving but they are still light years behind the likes of CX and SQ.
LX resuming it's PEK/SHA services is much more likely than a Chinese airline starting GVA.
Ezycrew From Spain, joined Oct 2001, 460 posts, RR: 4 Reply 19, posted (8 years 4 months 2 weeks 4 days 11 hours ago) and read 1991 times:
YUL332LX
I worked for Swiss World (in Sales) and we were really excited to start GVA-YUL (and GVA-MIA). There was huge demand from individuals and travel agents, much more than for our GVA-EWR service.
And what non-legacy carrier would operate GVA-YUL? Certainly no LCC's, as it's so different from their business plans. And I doubt FlyBaboo would ever invest in such an operation...
Are you maybe thinking ZOOM? That'd be cool, but they'd need to advertize heavily as no-one even heard of them here.
Beijing21 From Switzerland, joined Nov 2004, 83 posts, RR: 0 Reply 20, posted (8 years 4 months 2 weeks 4 days 11 hours ago) and read 1991 times:
So we agree that EK and at some extent EY will grab the market pretty significantly leaving no major stakes behind.
I just have some doubt about the other airlines, except MEA, being virtually profitable or at least profitable with GVA service: KU, SV, IR and RJ. How can a twice weekly service to the US being successful and a one/two time a week service to either AMM, RUH or KWI ?
What about Japan. Japan was connected up to 5 times a week under swissair's reign (or regime...) from GVA. JAL has even a travel agent located at GVA airport even if they only codeshare LX from ZRH. In addition to this Japan is in the top 3 long-haul destinations censored as the most popular dest. And if I'm not mistaken, ANA opened several years ago a local sale office downtown Geneva.
By the way, it's sad that the west african market has drown with the demise of swissair.
Ezycrew From Spain, joined Oct 2001, 460 posts, RR: 4 Reply 21, posted (8 years 4 months 2 weeks 4 days 11 hours ago) and read 1978 times:
Actually I don't remember SR having a nonstop service to Japan, ever. They had an M11 flight to KIX in the 90's, but it routed GVA-ZRH-KIX-ZRH-GVA.
Maybe with the 7E7's long range, smaller capacity and costs, one might see an Asian carrier in GVA in a few years time. For Now I think ANA is happy to route it's GVA pax through Star partner LH in FRA.
Beijing21 From Switzerland, joined Nov 2004, 83 posts, RR: 0 Reply 22, posted (8 years 4 months 2 weeks 4 days 11 hours ago) and read 1955 times:
Agree for the SR service to Japan. Indeed the routing was only outbounb GVA but remains 5 times a week and SR advertised a lot the route so I suppose thee int'l orgs., NGOs and multinational comp. were reg. users and I don't think they cared about changing equipment in ZRH when flying back from Japan. Anyway, I think too the 7E7 or another type between 200-230 pax could match the demand.
I also regret that Swiss World didn't work. I think they were hampered by swissair spies anywhere they got to sign up for leasing aircrafts and bad management choices for route strategy. MIA is a mature market for latin and South America. At the time the US will relieve the embargo on Cuba I expect AA to operate out from GVA but could work even today with the umber of connections simply, simply, simply...
I try to query regularly about how new legs are doing. Last time in November 50% of the people said that KU to ORD via GVA did not too bad and the others said the opposite...
Any info for December ?
Will SV and RJ ( not seasonnally ) ever raise their frequencies in GVA because their connecting possibilites might be okay. RJ ads frequently BKK flights.
Beijing21 From Switzerland, joined Nov 2004, 83 posts, RR: 0 Reply 24, posted (8 years 4 months 2 weeks 4 days 11 hours ago) and read 1949 times:
Air Transat is charter, right ? I think the type of pax in GVA will more looking on reg. services
25 Ezycrew: YUL332lx No airlines in Switzerland have been interested by a GVA-YUL service, because... there just are not that many airlines apart from Swiss!! Bel
26 Beijing21: Agree with you Ezycrew, even airlines do operate from EWR or JFK, the region of Savoie and Western Switzerland or its catching area hasn't the same au
27 YUL332LX: Beijing21, TS has scheduled rights to many European Countries (France, UK, Germany and Italy among others). Since there is no non-srop services right
28 Beijing21: YUL332LX, Thanks for the additionnal info on Air Transat. Well a one time a week service could stimulate te holoiday market provide facts over the por
29 Lxsaab2000: About asian carriers , didn't THAI serve GVA just a few years ago? Why did TG decide to give up the route?
30 Beijing21: The reason for thai was SRAS, Iraq war, the general bad situation of worls econonmy that affected in that time its tourism industry and defenitely the
31 Lxsaab2000: Is there in Switzerland an "open-sky" with USA? Are there in Switzerland "strong" bilateral agreements with other countries?Could the extra-European c
32 Sr3496: Switzerland has en open-sky agreement with the US. And ZRH is not more privileged than other Swiss airports (at least not in such belongings you talk
33 Matterhorn: BKK-GVA via ZRH would never have been profitable, even if sars and the iraq crisis did not emerge. The main reason was the routing. crews had to chang
34 AirMale: If GVA was such a money spinner, why have not more longhaul airlines started flying there??? Any EU carrier could set up a hub if they wanted to.....
35 AirMale: And about QR to GVA: I dont think this is happening anytime soon. As long as they can not even fill their small A319LR to Zurich, they would be mad mo
36 Beijing21: I don't know what to think about QR in ZRH. Seems they want to pick up traffic volumes, high yield, to areas in India and South East Asia where majors
37 Airmale: SV, RJ and KU carry a large amout of VFR traffic which is very important and usually its the carrier with the lowest fares who gets the business. VFR
38 Beijing21: So these 3 companies are usually profitable even with the cost to change crews... I thought both SV and KU are serving GVA for political reasons as we
39 Beijing21: Airmale, Can you explain me what does VFR mean here. Visual Flight Rules???
41 Beijing21: Thanks for the Info. Not even doubt about the acronyme
42 RichardJF: wait for NZ 7E7 AKL-SIN-GVA-LAX-AKL 2W AKL-BKK-GVA-LAX-AKL 1W AKL-HKG-GVA-SFO-AKL 2W AKL-HKG-GVA-GRU-AKL 2W Who needs Swiss?
43 Beijing21: With all due respect, I don't think NZ will launch these routes. By the way I think the impact on the route structure by the introduction of the 7E7 w
44 RichardJF: Beijing21 - None are rumored more just speculation. Such long legged routes will make a lot of sense. There will be many high yielding secondary citie
45 Gerardo: Sorry, RichardJF, but that sounds as if ANA would start Kyoto-Melbourne-Oberpfaffenhofen-Wichita-Melbourne with their B7e7. I guess, your predictions
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