Vueling

[Jerry]

Thanks for keeping us up to date with this. Be interesting to see what eventually the schedule will be.

If Alicante goes 6 weekly that'll be great and hopefully they might follow with Malaga.
I don't think they'd increase PMI though especially if Flybe start it.
I am slightly concerned about BCN not showing but hopefully it'll get reloaded sooner rather than later hopefully 4 weekly again!

 

[Jerry]

If Vuelings Twitter account is to be believed then BCN and the CWL-ALC flights won't be onsale till the next update which is in December!

 

[Jerry]

Just had a quick look at Skyscanner and Kayak and both legs of the Alicante are onsale there. BCN is not though.

 

[CWL94]

Maybe it’s worth getting in contact with CWL on social media for clarity if you have doubts that BCN might be dropped?

 

[Jerry]

Maybe it’s worth getting in contact with CWL on social media for clarity if you have doubts that BCN might be dropped?

Someone from the Fly2Cardiff facebook page has emailed them asking about it but there has been no reply. It would be very disappointing if Vueling dropped BCN.

 

[CWL94]

I generally find them to be good at replying back on Twitter. If it hasn’t been dropped I’m sure if someone asked the question they would want to make it known to stop rumours spreading.

Personally I can’t see any reason why a route would be removed off sale and still off two weeks later unless it’s either been dropped or starting later in the season (mid June)

 

[Jerry]

When I asked them about it on Twitter they said it was a bug in the system.

It would be a blow to lose such an established route or even have it cut to starting in June. Unless CWL could get another airline to operate it.
At the moment it is looking possible that in 2019 CWL won't have flights to Barcelona, Berlin and Dusseldorf which would be a step back imo for the airport. Let's hope that doesn't happen.

 

[CWL94]

BCN LF's this summer

April - 74%
May - 72%
June - 89%
July - 80%
August - 89%

 

[Foxlimayankee]

I can't see BCN being dropped. It's VY's hub. Before assumptions and rumours start expanding which could be damaging, let's wait for confirmation.

 

[Jerry]

Those are decent LFs though obviously we don't know the yield.
Whatever is going on at the moment it looks a bit odd and also has the potential to lose customers.

 

[Jerry]

Alicante is mostly back to normal for S19. There are 5 weekly outbound flights onsale and 6 weekly inbound flights onsale with the extra on Mondays that would leave Friday as the only day it doesn't operate on.

Barcelona is unchanged and not onsale.

 

[CWL94]

It has been confirmed by CWL that BCN has been dropped - this was assumed by some on here beforehand. The airport management team must be commended for acting so quickly (less than a month) to secure FR on the route before most even knew VY had dropped it.

It is obviously a shame, and I feel a little sad about it as VY was the saviour for CWL and took a risk operating at the airport when it was at it's lowest when no other airline wanted to know. They in 2016 had their best summer with BCN, where we also had A321's on the route in August due to high demand. That summer 30,626 pax used the service, compared to 19,813 in 2015, 15,045 in 2014, 13,688 in 2013 and 16,131 in 2012

After the successful summer in 2016 where it increased from 3 to 4x weekly - VY changed the timings on flights for Summer 2017 to either early morning departures from BCN (07:05) or late night arrivals (00:50) This as most can imagine put pax off booking due to the unattractive flight times. That resulted in a loss from 30,626 pax in 2016 to 25,673 in 2017

Some might argue why didnt VY drop the route in 2017 after poor LF's that year, compared to 2018. Comparisons below

April
2017 - 2433 passengers - 56% LF - 101 pax per flight (3x weekly - 3x A320)
2018 - 2974 passengers - 74% LF - 124 pax per flight (3x weekly - 2x A320 + 1x A319)

May
2017 - 2865 passengers - 56% LF - 101 pax per flight (3x weekly - 3x A320)
2018 - 3524 passengers - 72% LF - 121 pax per flight (3x weekly - 2x A320 + 1x A319)

June
2017 - 3565 passengers - 58% LF - 104 pax per flight (4x weekly - All A320)
2018 - 3863 passengers - 89% LF - 149 pax per flight (3x weekly - 2x A320 + 1x A319)

July
2017 - 4462 passengers - 73% LF - 131 pax per flight (4x weekly - All A320)
2018 - 3559 passengers - 80% LF - 136 pax per flight (3x weekly - 2x A320 + 1x A319)

August
2017 - 5787 passengers - 89% LF - 160 pax per flight (4x weekly - All A320)
2018 - 3921 passengers - 89% LF - 159 pax per flight (3x weekly - 2x A320 + 1x A319)

September
2017 - 4082 passengers - 70% LF - 126 pax per flight
2018 - TBA

October
2017 - 2136 passengers - 55% LF - 99 pax per flight
2018 - TBA

From the months that can be compared above - every month apart from August where it is the same in terms of LF, 2018 beats 2017 month on month which is why some might be scratching heads to why it happened this year not last. Some might argue though that the slots for this summer were more attractive than 2017 - and VY might have come to the conclusion that the yield just wasn't strong enough for these prime time slots?

The VY PMI service has been around the same as BCN in terms of LF - (August was lower) But I imagine with most of these pax being holiday makers, yield would be stronger with most paying to sit together, and paying for checked luggage etc!

 

[Jerry]

It is a shame they dropped the route but at least the airport won't lose it with Ryanair taking it over and fingers crossed they'll thrive on it and hopefully they'll keep increasing the frequency on their other routes. I can't see them introducing another route though. Cardiff though will still have 15 weekly flights from them next summer at least.
So it seems now that the last Vueling BCN flight will be on the 27th October this Saturday.

 

[TheLocalYokel]

I note that the highest average loads with Vueling were in August 2017 and 2018. 159/160 per flight with Ryanair would translate into a load factor approaching 85%. Although we know that yield and not load factor is the thing that matters to airlines, Ryanair does rely generally on very high load factors so no doubt the airline will be hoping for at least that sort of load through most of the summer months which, in airport footfall terms, will go some way to compensating for the reduction in weekly rotations compared with Vueling.

 

[louis_walton]

It is a shame they dropped the route but at least the airport won't lose it with Ryanair taking it over and fingers crossed they'll thrive on it and hopefully they'll keep increasing the frequency on their other routes. I can't see them introducing another route though. Cardiff though will still have 15 weekly flights from them next summer at least.
So it seems now that the last Vueling BCN flight will be on the 27th October this Saturday.

It wouldn't surprise me if Vueling had been planning on dropping the route for a while however because they wanted to maintain the good relationship with CWL (which they still have) warned them so that they could find another carrier. It's a great thing really as Ryanair can further expand their frequency at CWL and Vueling can add extra frequencies.

 

[Jerry]

Last Vueling scheduled arrival from Barcelona operated by EC-MIR an A319
View media item 8085

 

[TheLocalYokel]

'Liked' because of the picture not because it's the last Vueling flight from BCN.

 

[Brum X]

Last Vueling scheduled arrival from Barcelona operated by EC-MIR an A319
View media item 8085

 

[Jerry]

It is a shame they are stopping after 6 years but the silver lining is that Ryanair are taking it over.

 

[TheLocalYokel]

It is a shame they are stopping after 6 years but the silver lining is that Ryanair are taking it over.

Indeed. Six years! Time just flies by.