London Heathrow, Kaliningrad, Bergen, Tallinn, Larnaca, Cardiff, Warsaw and Thessaloniki will be dropped.

https://www.totbarcelona.cat/economia/v ... 25102.html

Vueling ha decidit cancel·lar vuit rutes europees des de l'Aeroport de Barcelona-El Prat per evitar un nou estiu caòtic. La més important és la de Heathrow (Londres), que es deixarà d'operar a partir del 30 març, tal com ha pogut saber el TOT Barcelona i fonts de la mateixa aerolínia han confirmat. La resta de vols que ja no estaran disponibles durant la pròxima temporada d'estiu són Kaliningrad (Rússia), Bergen (Noruega), Tallin (Estònia), Làrnaca (Xipre), Cardiff (Gal·les), Varsòvia (Polònia) i Tessalònica (Grècia).

Weird article as some of these destinations aren't served from Barcelona on Vueling anyway. Perhaps they intended to fly there, but set those plans aside now.

Some cancellations are understandable. Heathrow is a very expensive airport and I'm sure IAG can use the slots better on British Airways than on Vueling. Barcelona remains served from Heathrow on British Airways of course.

Warsaw once saw 7 airlines flying to Barcelona, including Ryanair from Modlin. A lot of them have already canceled this route or made it seasonal. Only LOT Polish Airlines, Ryanair and Vueling remain. Now it's time for Vueling to pull the plug as well, just like Norwegian and Wizzair did before them. Ryanair keeps serving Barcelona from Modlin and soon LOT will be the only airline left serving it from Chopin.

On the Cardiff route Vueling has to compete with Ryanair, not an easy task. They just leave this route to Ryanair.

For Larnaca and Thessaloniki I guess there never was a great market. All are in a similar position as holiday destinations by the Mediterranean sea. Not much traffic between places that basically offer the same thing.

SCQ83 wrote:

London Heathrow, Kaliningrad, Bergen, Tallinn, Larnaca, Cardiff, Warsaw and Thessaloniki will be dropped.

https://www.totbarcelona.cat/economia/v ... 25102.html

Vueling ha decidit cancel·lar vuit rutes europees des de l'Aeroport de Barcelona-El Prat per evitar un nou estiu caòtic. La més important és la de Heathrow (Londres), que es deixarà d'operar a partir del 30 març, tal com ha pogut saber el TOT Barcelona i fonts de la mateixa aerolínia han confirmat. La resta de vols que ja no estaran disponibles durant la pròxima temporada d'estiu són Kaliningrad (Rússia), Bergen (Noruega), Tallin (Estònia), Làrnaca (Xipre), Cardiff (Gal·les), Varsòvia (Polònia) i Tessalònica (Grècia).

Another strange news, from these routes being cancelled. Which routes will lose all flights to BCN?

I think BEG might be next since Air Serbia is launching year-round flights this June. I doubt the market is large enough for two players.

PatrickZ80 wrote:

Some cancellations are understandable. Heathrow is a very expensive airport and I'm sure IAG can use the slots better on British Airways than on Vueling. Barcelona remains served from Heathrow on British Airways of course..

Indeed I also think that Vueling should not touch LHR (or MAD but that’s for another thread)
But IAG found a cost cutting measure to have Vueling operate the first flight BCN-LHR and last LHR-BCN of the day with Vueling crew based in BCN. That way no BA crew would have to overnight in BCN.
I seems it didn’t work out. VY has a rather limited codeshare scheme. Just IB like pretty much everything touching BCN and BA. And interlining is not that great either. So OW inbound LHR traffic would have trouble connecting onto Vueling out even being based at the same T3.

PatrickZ80 wrote:

On the Cardiff route Vueling has to compete with Ryanair, not an easy task. They just leave this route to Ryanair.

A real shame. This Vueling flight was one of the few options for avios in Wales. Now even less option with Flybe shifting towards VS.

PatrickZ80 wrote:

Warsaw once saw 7 airlines flying to Barcelona, including Ryanair from Modlin.

LOT, Wizzair, Ryanair, Norwegian, Vueling... who else?

On the Cardiff route Vueling has to compete with Ryanair, not an easy task. They just leave this route to Ryanair.

Although there wasn't any official announcement about them dropping the route. It's believe FR stepped in after VY pulled it, rather than VY pulling it because of FR.
FR have recently announced CWL-AGP, going to head to head with VY. At the moment (summer 19) VY are 6x weekly and FR twice weekly.

konkret wrote:

PatrickZ80 wrote:

Warsaw once saw 7 airlines flying to Barcelona, including Ryanair from Modlin.

LOT, Wizzair, Ryanair, Norwegian, Vueling... who else?

Enter Air and Travel Service Poland.

caaardiff wrote:

FR have recently announced CWL-AGP, going to head to head with VY. At the moment (summer 19) VY are 6x weekly and FR twice weekly.

True, however on leisure routes the frequency is less important. To the price sensitive passengers (which Ryanair and Vueling are both after) it doesn't matter when they fly as long as it's cheap. If the cheap flight goes on Tuesday, they fly on Tuesday. If it goes on Friday, they fly on Friday. If one week is expensive and the next week is cheap, they fly the next week.

Sure a high frequency is convenient for those who put convenience above price. However the passengers on these kind of routes are the opposite, they put price above convenience.

SQ789 wrote:

Another strange news, from these routes being cancelled. Which routes will lose all flights to BCN?

Kaliningrad, Tallinn, Larnaca and Thessaloniki will be unserved. Ryanair is starting CWL in summer season so it will take the route.

It is not strange. This is a list of all the VY destinations cancelled in BCN in the last few years. The list is long so there is probably some destination missing. I count a whopping 49 destinations that are no longer served by VY from BCN. In brackets destinations that are unserved as today from BCN (a total of 29).

1. Accra (unserved) / 1
2. Amman
3. Ancona (unserved) / 2
4. Belfast City (unserved) / 3
5. Bergen
6. Cardiff
7. Ciudad Real (unserved) / 4
8. Cluj Napoca
9. Constantine (unserved) / 5
10. Djerba (unserved) / 6
11. Dortmund (unserved) / 7
12. Dresden (unserved) / 8
13. Eindhoven
14. Frankfurt
15. Groningen (unserved) / 9
16. Istanbul Sabiha Gökçen
17. Kaliningrad (unserved) / 10
18. Kazan (unserved) / 11
19. Kos (unserved) / 12
20. Krasnodar (unserved) / 13
21. Larnaca (unserved) / 14
22. Leeds
23. Leipzig (unserved) / 15
24. Ljubljana (unserved) / 16
25. London Heathrow
26. London Luton
27. Lourdes (unserved) / 17
28. Luxembourg
29. Maastricht (unserved) / 18
30. Moscow Sheremetyevo
31. Newcastle
32. Pamplona (unserved) / 19
33. Rabat (unserved) / 20
34. Rhodes (unserved) / 21
35. Riga
36. Rotterdam
37. Sal (Cape Verde) (unserved) / 22
38. Samara (unserved) / 23
39. Sofia
40. Southampton (unserved) / 24
41. Stavanger
42. Strasbourg (unserved) / 25
43. Tallinn (unserved) / 26
44. Thessaloniki (unserved) / 27
45. Trieste (unserved) / 28
46. Verona (unserved) / 29
47. Vilnius
48. Yerevan
49. Warsaw

PatrickZ80 wrote:

Warsaw once saw 7 airlines flying to Barcelona, including Ryanair from Modlin. A lot of them have already canceled this route or made it seasonal. Only LOT Polish Airlines, Ryanair and Vueling remain. Now it's time for Vueling to pull the plug as well, just like Norwegian and Wizzair did before them. Ryanair keeps serving Barcelona from Modlin and soon LOT will be the only airline left serving it from Chopin.

This is a good example of how overheated Barcelona as a market was. But those last couple of years has been a return to reality.

BCN closed 2018 with a record 50M since VY is much more aggressive with connections (and a connecting passenger counts as double), yet the number of tourists in the city is down. Not to mention self connections to long-haul low-cost. Barcelona has to increasingly compete with other cities like Lisbon, Porto, Athens, Valencia, Naples or Marseille which are booming. Warsaw/Poland is again a very interesting example. Only 5 years ago most of those seaside Southern European cities that I mentioned in my previous phrase were not connected to Poland. Now Ryanair/Wizzair fly there to all of them. Polish have more choice.

It is also interesting that some of those secondary destinations that are currently unserved from BCN have gained service from MAD in the last few years. For instance Rabat (served by FR in MAD) or Verona (served by FR and YW in MAD). That would be unthinkable 5 years ago.

The article says that VY is canceling these destinations to avoid another chaotic summer. Can anyone explain?

ro1960 wrote:

The article says that VY is canceling these destinations to avoid another chaotic summer. Can anyone explain?

2016: https://elpais.com/elpais/2016/07/04/in ... 10185.html

Vueling execs called in to explain flight chaos at Barcelona airport

https://www.lemonde.fr/economie/article ... _3234.html (in French)

Vueling : low cost, big chaos

2018: https://elpais.com/elpais/2018/08/07/in ... 45752.html

Spanish authorities are requesting explanations from Vueling, one of the least punctual airlines in Europe

Vueling never really advertised the Belfast City route when they operated it. Which was a shame as BCN route from Belfast International is only seasonal. If another airline came in with better times it could do well as airport passenger numbers in the North have increased.

Blerg wrote:

I think BEG might be next since Air Serbia is launching year-round flights this June. I doubt the market is large enough for two players.

I wouldn't be surprised. It seems BCN is getting out of style for Eastern Europeans / ex-USSR / ex-Yus. Those airports have now many more non-stop routes to other faster-growing seaside cities in Southern Europe like Athens, Naples, Marseille, Valencia, Porto or Lisbon (while tourism in BCN was down in 2018).

Not only VY chopping Ljubliana, Sofia, the 3 Baltic capitals or secondary Russia, or 5 carriers (!!) cancelling Warsaw, but also Wizz Air has recently cancelled Gdansk (despite traffic at GDN growing at double digit for a few years now) and made Skopje seasonal.

SCQ83 wrote:

ro1960 wrote:

The article says that VY is canceling these destinations to avoid another chaotic summer. Can anyone explain?

2016: https://elpais.com/elpais/2016/07/04/in ... 10185.html

Vueling execs called in to explain flight chaos at Barcelona airport

https://www.lemonde.fr/economie/article ... _3234.html (in French)

Vueling : low cost, big chaos

2018: https://elpais.com/elpais/2018/08/07/in ... 45752.html

Spanish authorities are requesting explanations from Vueling, one of the least punctual airlines in Europe

Thanks for the links. So basically they're revising their growth plans downwards because they don't have the resources to operate the additional flights reliably.

SCQ83 wrote:

Blerg wrote:

I think BEG might be next since Air Serbia is launching year-round flights this June. I doubt the market is large enough for two players.

I wouldn't be surprised. It seems BCN is getting out of style for Eastern Europeans / ex-USSR / ex-Yus. Those airports have now many more non-stop routes to other faster-growing seaside cities in Southern Europe like Athens, Naples, Marseille, Valencia, Porto or Lisbon (while tourism in BCN was down in 2018).

Not only VY chopping Ljubliana, Sofia, the 3 Baltic capitals or secondary Russia, or 5 carriers (!!) cancelling Warsaw, but also Wizz Air has recently cancelled Gdansk (despite traffic at GDN growing at double digit for a few years now) and made Skopje seasonal.

I also think it has to do with Barcelona no longer being that interesting for many. It was extremely popular right after people started travelling but now many are going to other countries/cities. I am speaking about eastern European people.

As for VY's BEG-BCN, it will be interesting to see what happens. Their operations there have been abysmal, constant delays on top of a horrid schedule. Imagine arriving at Barcelona at 04.00.

I am closely following what will become of them in the future though. Seems like they are losing their compass a bit.

ro1960 wrote:

So basically they're revising their growth plans downwards because they don't have the resources to operate the additional flights reliably.

Or this could be just the excuse they were waiting for to axe 9 not-very-profitable routes and at the same time save face.

Aisak wrote:

A real shame. This Vueling flight was one of the few options for avios in Wales. Now even less option with Flybe shifting towards VS.

If there is availability on VY, the cash fare tends to be so low to make it a pretty poor value for the Avios. But if you're avios rich and without much cash, it would make sense.

On the BCN-SKG VY made a bad choice of flyin the route at really unpopular times like 0330am...while FR flies more normal times to GRO though..So many families and working couples chose to fly at more humane times with FR than drag little kids sleepless at 01am at the airport..It s a shame because with more marketing (VY didnt do any) and with better flyin times VY could have stayed and won over the public..It certainly did have the support of local tourist agents with all trips to Barcelona booked with Vueling..One other disadvantage against FR is that they flew only end of june till beginnimg of Sept,while FR started end of March till end of Oct..You can imagine how people chose FR first

marcogr12 wrote:

On the BCN-SKG VY made a bad choice of flyin the route at really unpopular times like 0330am...while FR flies more normal times to GRO though..So many families and working couples chose to fly at more humane times with FR than drag little kids sleepless at 01am at the airport..It s a shame because with more marketing (VY didnt do any) and with better flyin times VY could have stayed and won over the public..It certainly did have the support of local tourist agents with all trips to Barcelona booked with Vueling..One other disadvantage against FR is that they flew only end of june till beginnimg of Sept,while FR started end of March till end of Oct..You can imagine how people chose FR first

Same story as BEG and LCA, all destinations were operated in the middle of the night. I guess so as to optimize connectivity at BCN. That said, when an airline is making the schedule they should factor in all the variables especially their competition. Like you said, why should someone go to the airport at 01.00 when there is a far more humane option. I am sure some even paid more and flew on Aegean either in the morning or the afternoon. Besides the price and the schedule, Vueling doesn't have much going on for it.

Blerg wrote:

marcogr12 wrote:

On the BCN-SKG VY made a bad choice of flyin the route at really unpopular times like 0330am...while FR flies more normal times to GRO though..So many families and working couples chose to fly at more humane times with FR than drag little kids sleepless at 01am at the airport..It s a shame because with more marketing (VY didnt do any) and with better flyin times VY could have stayed and won over the public..It certainly did have the support of local tourist agents with all trips to Barcelona booked with Vueling..One other disadvantage against FR is that they flew only end of june till beginnimg of Sept,while FR started end of March till end of Oct..You can imagine how people chose FR first

Same story as BEG and LCA, all destinations were operated in the middle of the night. I guess so as to optimize connectivity at BCN. That said, when an airline is making the schedule they should factor in all the variables especially their competition. Like you said, why should someone go to the airport at 01.00 when there is a far more humane option. I am sure some even paid more and flew on Aegean either in the morning or the afternoon. Besides the price and the schedule, Vueling doesn't have much going on for it.

I confirm that. I flew LCA-BCN multiple times last summer, flights were full and prices were not exactly cheap. However, due to their exhausting schedule I was tempted to book Aegean via ATH.

PatrickZ80 wrote:

caaardiff wrote:

FR have recently announced CWL-AGP, going to head to head with VY. At the moment (summer 19) VY are 6x weekly and FR twice weekly.

True, however on leisure routes the frequency is less important. To the price sensitive passengers (which Ryanair and Vueling are both after) it doesn't matter when they fly as long as it's cheap. If the cheap flight goes on Tuesday, they fly on Tuesday. If it goes on Friday, they fly on Friday. If one week is expensive and the next week is cheap, they fly the next week.

Sure a high frequency is convenient for those who put convenience above price. However the passengers on these kind of routes are the opposite, they put price above convenience.

Absolutely. I don't think VY and FR could've compete on CWL-BCN. When VY set up at CWL several years ago, they were an unknown brand in Wales and pretty much most of the UK. BCN was the golden route being the hub, but never seemed to do that great. Over the last few years the passenger figures grew quite well, but we don't know the yield. What was obvious though was the LF was higher when the timings were good, but in the most recent years the timings weren't great and the figures seemed to show that. FR stepping in should work, as although VY generally offered decent prices on CWL-BCN the timings weren't great and EZY on BRS-BCN is generally cheaper and is also double daily through the summer.

As for PMI, AGP and ALC, they have grown to be quite successful routes from CWL, PMI probably not as good as ALC and AGP though. PMI is 4x weekly Apr-Oct, ALC is 3x weekly up to March, then 6 weekly for summer and not yet on sale for next winter, AGP is 2 weekly in winter and 5 weekly during summer and not yet on sale for winter (correction from previous post)
Personally I think AGP and ALC have potential to be daily and will hopefully to continue to perform well for VY even with FR coming in on the route. These routes have very high frequencies from BRS, which many Welsh people use, so hopefully FR won't hurt VY in CWL, but will offer good enough prices to win people back that would normally use FR or EZY in BRS. Peak season VY can be quite expensive on these routes but they generally have a good load factor.

One thing I've always been curious about, and hopefully someone can give some insight, is how well does VY connection set up at BCN work? Is it popular with travellers outside of Spain connecting through BCN?

I believe the strategy Vueling is following for Barcelona (and thus, for the most of its network), is to fly more frequencies to existing destinations rather than adding new routes. That affected the least frequent routes, which are mainly the ones reported here. Many have been cancelled few seasons ago, namely Stavanger, Luxembourg or Eindhoven.

Despite that, and the last summer season which was pretty terrible from an operations perspective.... one of the most important Twitter accounts tracking data and figures for BCN reported last January:

"Vueling transported this January 2019 2.024.000 pax (+9.1% vs January '18) with a load factor of 78.9% (-0.5 vs January '18)". I wouldn't call January the peak month for aviation in general, not for sure for traffics in Barcelona. In general terms though, Vueling hasn't stopped its growth at their main base:

-Y2015: 14.727.366pax. This is when Vueling hits the max. amount of non-stop routes served from BCN.
-Y2016: 15.912.256pax.
-Y2017: 17.174.796pax.
-Y2018: 19.213.308pax.

One could still blame the traffic doesn't grow at the pace it used to before 2015. Different interpretations are always possible. The truth is the airport in summer cannot handle much more traffic because the terminals are over-crowded. I know some international airlines have asked for more departure slots which eventually haven't been granted due to traffic restrictions.

Interesting that Vueling have tried and tested just about every corner of the UK except Scotland (with the exception of EDI where it sees relative success with the BCN route but dropped ORY/ALC/FCO).

Blerg wrote:

Same story as BEG and LCA, all destinations were operated in the middle of the night. I guess so as to optimise connectivity at BCN.

I reckon it is a mix of optimising connectivity (some of those destinations were served from Spain only with VY from BCN) and also aircraft use (otherwise those planes would remain parked in BCN).

SCQ83 wrote:

Blerg wrote:

Same story as BEG and LCA, all destinations were operated in the middle of the night. I guess so as to optimise connectivity at BCN.

I reckon it is a mix of optimising connectivity (some of those destinations were served from Spain only with VY from BCN) and also aircraft use (otherwise those planes would remain parked in BCN).

Well let's see what happens. Air Serbia has already upgraded 5 flights in August from A319 to A320. I was told they are doing well with advance bookings on the route.

mspeaumsn wrote:

What's going to happen to the LHR slots then?

They were leased from Virgin Atlantic. Looks like they will use them for the new Tel Aviv service. Through S19 before the new route they may do ghost flights

SeanM1997 wrote:

mspeaumsn wrote:

What's going to happen to the LHR slots then?

They were leased from Virgin Atlantic. Looks like they will use them for the new Tel Aviv service. Through S19 before the new route they may do ghost flights

Same as slots used by Vueling on LCG-LHR, the only remaining LHR Vueling route.

However that route is heavily subsidised by the city council of A Coruña (God knows why) so they will keep for a while until IAG gets tired and is moved to LGW.

Madeira (Funchal) also cancelled. 9 destinations cancelled and a total of 50 in the last few years.

Liverpool was also cancelled in last 2 years but not on the list so that’s 51.

SCQ83 wrote:

Blerg wrote:

I think BEG might be next since Air Serbia is launching year-round flights this June. I doubt the market is large enough for two players.

I wouldn't be surprised. It seems BCN is getting out of style for Eastern Europeans / ex-USSR / ex-Yus. Those airports have now many more non-stop routes to other faster-growing seaside cities in Southern Europe like Athens, Naples, Marseille, Valencia, Porto or Lisbon (while tourism in BCN was down in 2018).

Not only VY chopping Ljubliana, Sofia, the 3 Baltic capitals or secondary Russia, or 5 carriers (!!) cancelling Warsaw, but also Wizz Air has recently cancelled Gdansk (despite traffic at GDN growing at double digit for a few years now) and made Skopje seasonal.

It is pretty simple really, Barcelona is becoming to expensive to compete with cheaper alternatives. Hotel rates in summer months are ridiculous, on average 30-40 euros higher than in those competing markets. Given that no new hotels are being built thanks to the communists in Barcelona city hall, hotel rates will remain uncompetitive for east europeans.