Cardiff Airport - General Thread

[MrFenner]

I am led to believe it is being used by the Home Office to house asylum seekers - but I’m none the wiser than just word of mouth…

 

[geoff]

Discussion on the other forum regarding the marketing Department at CWL on how poor it is operating, I think some of the remarks are justifiable, when there has been nothing published on their news section since the 27th June when the new Belfast service was announced. I know airports do not like publishing bad news eg. WIZZ, but they could publish the new services from them. One poster on dried plum, was quoting two instances lately , where two different people booked to Dublin and Amsterdam from BRS, because they were unaware those destinations were available from CWL. Let's hope things will improve in the future.

 

[Jerry]

where two different people booked to Dublin and Amsterdam from BRS,

With things like that though a quick google search would surely show that up?
The airport does put out social media posts but I wouldn't be surprised if the person who now does that is either part time or has another role at the airport.

 

[geoff]

I think a lot of South Wales residents just think of Easyjet and Ryanair and automatically book from BRS. The CWL marketing team was small to begin with, I think during Covid lockdown it was virtually closed, let's hope the new positions to be filled, will be people with plenty of enthusiasm, who will shout the advantages of travelling via CWL from the rooftops.

 

[Jerry]

I think a lot of South Wales residents just think of Easyjet and Ryanair and automatically book from BRS.

It depends where you live but Ryanair app does give you the closest option for flights not sure about the website, I wouldn't be surprised if it defaults to Bristol and people just don't look. Obviously Easyjet is different as they don't fly from Cardiff.

 

[Jerry]

Updated 18/8/22 to reflect the loss of the Wizz Air base.
This is only an approximation of what winter 2022/23 could look like from Cardiff Airport as some airlines aren't onsale so i've made an educated guess on what their schedule could look like. For the others i've gone from the 1st week of December. I haven't included Eastern because i have my doubts they will be operating from the airport in the future. Hopefully airlines will add more routes and flights.
Just to summarise winter 2022/23 could see 1 based aircraft at the airport, 1 overnighting aircraft, 11 destinations, 53 weekly departures, 13,703 seats onsale.
TUI 1 based 737 8
5 routes 9 weekly departures 3402 seats
Lanzarote 2 weekly
Malaga 1 weekly
Alicante 2 weekly
Gran Canaria 1 weekly
Tenerife 3 weekly
Wizz Air A321
2 routes 4 weekly departures 1880 seats (1488 if A320 used)
Milan MXP 2 weekly
Bucharest 2 weekly
Loganair E145
1 route 6 weekly departures 588 seats
Edinburgh 6 weekly
KLM E175 & E190
1 route 20 weekly departures 3688 seats
Amsterdam 20 weekly
Ryanair 737 8
1 route 4 weekly departures 1512 seats
Dublin 4 weekly
Vueling A320
3 routes 5 weekly departures 1860 seats
Alicante 3 weekly
Malaga 2 weekly
Aer Lingus
1 route 5 weekly departures 720 seats
Belfast City 5 weekly

 

[Jerry]

The loss of the Wizz Air base will mean 10 less weekly departures, 2 less destinations and 4483 less weekly seats onsale and to be honest i expect it to be less because i just can't see KLM running a full 20 weekly schedule.

 

[geoff]

Really disappointing regarding WIZZ news, but RYANAIR have certainly made a success of the Dublin route, it is likely to be the busiest route this winter, unless KLM get back to three a day. In fairness to VUELING they have remained faithful to CWL. Let's hope all the airlines operating at CWL will expand their routes in 2023.

 

[Jerry]

Really disappointing regarding WIZZ news, but RYANAIR have certainly made a success of the Dublin route, it is likely to be the busiest route this winter, unless KLM get back to three a day. In fairness to VUELING they have remained faithful to CWL. Let's hope all the airlines operating at CWL will expand their routes in 2023.

Even with the cut Wizz will still have more seats onsale between their 2 routes than Ryanair but i doubt very much if they'll sell more actual seats than Wizz but Dublin is some nice positivity during a disappointing time.

 

[geoff]

Nothing for CWL in the route announcements today by FlyBE, TUI also announced today that they were expanding flights to Barbados for both cruises and beach stays, I don't whether CWL will have better luck with them..

 

[Jerry]

Nothing for CWL in the route announcements today by FlyBE, TUI also announced today that they were expanding flights to Barbados for both cruises and beach stays, I don't whether CWL will have better luck with them..

Looking at TUI it doesn't look like there is anything extra for Cardiff concerning Barbados.

 

[geoff]

I was unable to find anything extra for Barbados, looks like CWL has missed out again.

 

[Jerry]

Yep it's disappointing but I suppose at least they're still operating flights from CWL. With them operating long haul from Bristol there must have been talks about shifting them to Bristol at one time or the other.

 

[Jerry]

Transun are now offering a one off 3 night Northern Lights trip on the 23/2/23 from Cardiff.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1564969005806411778

 

[MrFenner]

Wow! CWL does have a social media team (person) then… they must work one day a month.

 

[Jerry]

They post regularly enough on twitter.

 

[MrFenner]

They post regularly enough on twitter.

Indeed. But not about the things they should be tweeting about - like new routes! And whoever their person is really doesn’t know how to use it properly…

Anyway, rant over.

 

[Jerry]

Indeed. But not about the things they should be tweeting about - like new routes! And whoever their person is really doesn’t know how to use it properly…

Anyway, rant over.

Well when new routes happen they do tweet about them and I suspect that whoever is in charge of the account probably has other jobs as well.

 

[geoff]

The only problem about social media is that many people do not use it, myself included. CWL has a news section on its web site, where nothing has been published since the 27th June. during which time Ryanair has added flights to Dublin on two separate months, Wizz air has announced winter flights to two new destinations, and Loganair has published next summers timetable. As I have stated previously, there are passengers travelling from BRS, to Dublin and Amsterdam because they are not aware of similar flights from CWL. When the new marketing executive is appointed could he or she please make a huge effort to advertise the airport with every means possible.

 

[Jerry]

The only problem about social media is that many people do not use it, myself included. CWL has a news section on its web site, where nothing has been published since the 27th June. during which time Ryanair has added flights to Dublin on two separate months, Wizz air has announced winter flights to two new destinations, and Loganair has published next summers timetable. As I have stated previously, there are passengers travelling from BRS, to Dublin and Amsterdam because they are not aware of similar flights from CWL. When the new marketing executive is appointed could he or she please make a huge effort to advertise the airport with every means possible.

Yeah they do seem to be neglecting that part of the website.