Breeze & maybe Rex ?

[ozfflyer]

All good ideas but I still think the economics don’t stack up especially the model where you need a package to entice people to come. Think package = discount.
Feel free to approach Alliance/VA but I suggest that VA are rationalising their offerings and trying to get rid of marginal operations.

Vail resorts have to get people to go to Falls/Hotham in Sept apart from few local weekenders.

They also need Qlders to come back to their resorts in Vic.

At present getting virtually no revenue from Qlders.

A package can just hide the fact, that they might be discounting lift tickets & thereby making any charter flights work.

$399 return BNE/ABX/BNE doesn’t sound too bad to me, cf. fares to ZQN & skiing is much better in OZ than NZ.

Not sure what cheapest fare BNE/SYD/ABX/SYD/BNE is, but suggest it might be over $400, very few seats at that price, not whole aircraft & timings might be ordinary.

If they said $699 air/transfer/lift tickets for as long as you stay, that would be an incentive to go to Falls/Hotham rather than NZ.

 

[ozfflyer]

Yes, packages don't always provide a sustainable business for airlines. Look at the collapse of Thomas Cook airlines in the UK - one of the big contributing factors was reliance on selling travel packages.

Thomas Cook didn't fail because of packages, they failed because their costs were way too high & systems way too old. They were living in the 90s, before LCCs.

Most skiers buy some sort of package(except maybe locals who drive), whether it's air & accom, air accom & lift tickets or accom & lift tickets.

OTAs don't sell much ski, cos it's too hard to do online.

If Vail did flights to ABX, they would control 2 of 3 main parts of package & re accom they would also generate resort fees.

 

[Quickstatus]

Vail resorts have to get people to go to Falls/Hotham in Sept apart from few local weekenders.

They also need Qlders to come back to their resorts in Vic.

At present getting virtually no revenue from Qlders.

A package can just hide the fact, that they might be discounting lift tickets & thereby making any charter flights work.

$399 return BNE/ABX/BNE doesn’t sound too bad to me, cf. fares to ZQN & skiing is much better in OZ than NZ.

Not sure what cheapest fare BNE/SYD/ABX/SYD/BNE is, but suggest it might be over $400, very few seats at that price, not whole aircraft & timings might be ordinary.

If they said $699 air/transfer/lift tickets for as long as you stay, that would be an incentive to go to Falls/Hotham rather than NZ.

Resorts are already discounting in low season. and they already do packages such as lift and lesson, lift and ski hire etc. Bringing in an airline partner
In the travel sector more and more travellers are going outside of packages.
I dont believe there are much upsides in packages. An airline cannot survive on packages.

I still believe the numbers don't stack up especially when incentives via packages are sought.

Jetgo could not make a go of BNE/ABX pair. I doubt anyone else can for the time being.

 

[ozfflyer]

Resorts are already discounting in low season. and they already do packages such as lift and lesson, lift and ski hire etc. Bringing in an airline partner
In the travel sector more and more travellers are going outside of packages.
I dont believe there are much upsides in packages. An airline cannot survive on packages.

I still believe the numbers don't stack up especially when incentives via packages are sought.

Jetgo could not make a go of BNE/ABX pair. I doubt anyone else can for the time being.

buying a snow holiday trip online is the very expensive way to do it. Online accom is not cheap, just convenient. You can find snow resort accom online, but then you don't get the 90% off lift tickets type of deals.

Just cos online agencies tell you it's cheaper online for hotels, doesn't mean it is. With hug commissions many demand up to 30%, all OTAs do is push prices up.

Alliance can do any number of charter flights, with down time on FIFO flights. Most FIFO flights seem to be mostly Mon to Thu, which is perfect for resorts who need flights Fri to Sun.

No one knows whether Jetgo made a go of it BNE/ABX & OOL/ABX. The fact that they increased BNE/ABX from around 3 or 4 per week to daily, seems to indicate that BNE/ABX was one of their profitable routes.

so Jetgo did up to 44 x 7 seats a week in each direction BNE/ABX ...... that's 308 seats. So if an 80 or 100 seater with a VA code was to do it 3 or 4 times a week, surely they could pick up much of that market & for days no nonstop, pax could fly BNE/SYD/ABX.

Jetgo had no feed. VA would have feed to & from other Qld ports & it might be the case, that VA might prefer any ABX originating pax, fly to USA, NZ, Pacific Islands, Japan via BNE, rather than SYD.

 

[dajop]

An airline cannot survive on packages.

Agreed. Airlines seem to use packages to fill empty seats, but I assume it becomes the problem when the number of empty seats = the whole plane.

Besides, ski-ing is a niche market, not something you build an airline on, certainly not in Australia.

Given population, demographics and Australia's favourite holiday destination, why isn't there a NCLNTL-DPS flight ???? (nb: edited. I think NCL-DPS is well beyond the range of an A220).

 

[ozfflyer]

Airlines seem to use packages to fill empty seats, but I assume it becomes the problem when the number of empty seats = the whole plane.

wholesale airfares used to be much cheaper than the cheapest airfare, on basis that min spend on ground content. The difference is not what it used to be, but for BNE/ABX/BNE talking maybe 2 return flights a week, with resort under-writing flights in some way & maybe selling seats to ABX locals as well.

 

[Quickstatus]

Again lots of good ideas but in the end I am highly skeptical

Again my strong assertion is that resorts have not and will not underwrite flights especially in Australia because that means the economics dont add up.

Perisher and Thredbo dont even underwrite a coach service to/from Jindabyne, let alone underwrite flights.

 

[dajop]

Also, for a non ski-er, what is the advantage of BNE-ABX- Falls Creek vs BNE-CBR-Perisher or BNE-ZQN? 40 mins less drive to Falls Creek I guess vs Perisher, but in terms of an overall travel time from home to ski resort, that seems to be marginal. But BNE-CBR flights have a lot more non ski traffic to support them.

 

[jb747]

I see the problem.

You want nice shiny aircraft. Good route structure. Frequency. And cheap.

Pick one.

 

[ozfflyer]

Again lots of good ideas but in the end I am highly skeptical

Again my strong assertion is that resorts have not and will not underwrite flights especially in Australia because that means the economics dont add up.

Perisher ahd Thredbo dont even underwrite a coach service to/from Jindabyne, let alone underwrite flights.

Perisher/Thredbo get most of business from SYD & CBR locals.

Buller gets most Mel skiers.

If a resort was to run flights at cost neutral, they pick up on everything else + by making resorts more accessible to Qlders stop some of the bleed to NZ.

 

[Quickstatus]

I see the problem.

You want nice shiny aircraft. Good route structure. Frequency. And cheap.

Pick one.

And go skiing

Pick one.

 

[ozfflyer]

Also, for a non ski-er, what is the advantage of BNE-ABX- Falls Creek vs BNE-CBR-Perisher or BNE-ZQN? 40 mins less drive to Falls Creek I guess vs Perisher, but in terms of an overall travel time from home to ski resort, that seems to be marginal. But BNE-CBR flights have a lot more non ski traffic to support them.

Thredbo/Perisher accom rates are much much higher than Falls/Hotham partly because if you want cheap accom in NSW you stay Jindabyne & drive each day, just like in NZ.

AM sure lots of ABX locals would like to escape there in winter & go to warmth in Qld. Melbourites do it by the 1000s.

Post automatically merged: Feb 18, 2020

I see the problem.

You want nice shiny aircraft. Good route structure. Frequency. And cheap.

Pick one.

F100/F70 are hardly new. One route BNE/ABX. $200 one way is probably the break even. More than BNE/MEL but MEL is a long way away. Cheaper than BNE/SYD/OOM & probably similar cost to BNE/CBR, but NSW resort costs are way higher.

 

[Quickstatus]

Perisher/Thredbo get most of business from SYD & CBR locals.

Buller gets most Mel skiers.

If a resort was to run flights at cost neutral, they pick up on everything else + by making resorts more accessible to Qlders stop some of the bleed to NZ.

No one can run flights at guaranteed cost neutral. That would mean someone else would have to pick up the tab if it doesnt.
Sorry Im being the devils advocate

Post automatically merged: Feb 18, 2020

One route BNE/ABX. $200 one way is probably the break even.

Thats not how airline economics work.
What load factors will you need to breakeven at an average of $200 a ticket?

 

[ozfflyer]

No one can run flights at guaranteed cost neutral. That would mean someone else would have to pick up the tab if it doesnt.
Sorry Im being the devils advocate

Post automatically merged: Feb 18, 2020

Thats not how airline economics work.
What load factors will you need to breakeven at an average of $200 a ticket?

no, you don't seem to get it. If the lift company normally charges say $500 for 5 1/2 or 6 days lift tickets, then they can play with this, cos the cost of giving someone cheaper lifts, the incremental cost, is very close to $0. Lifts operate no matter how many people use them. Just a fraction more electricity/maintenance maybe. If skier doesn't come from Qld, they get $0 anyway.

So instead of charging $400 for return air or $500 for lift tickets, at time when unlikely to fill aircraft, they could charge a number in between like $699, so the perceived value of the return airfare was $199.

Fly to Falls/Hotham for $199 airfare & stay on snow,

sounds a lot better than pay $450 to $800 or more to fly to ZQN, stay off snow & have to rent a car, stuff around with snow chains, drive 1-3 hours to ski hills everyday they are open & not closed due to winds.

Just like river cruise companies in EU saying buy the cruise for $x & the ari to EU is free. Of course it's not free, but bet the cruise companies get much better deals than you or I could get on air, simply due to massive numbers, so the perceived value of the air, is much higher than what the cruise companies pay.

 

[Quickstatus]

Haha that old chestnut - the assets are running anyway so why not let people use it on a cost neutral basis.

Airlines do it but they restrict those fares in a very limited fare bucket on each flight.

You still have not explained who will guarantee that the flights will be cost neutral. What if the flights start losing money. Who covers that? Having cheap lift tickets is not a guarantee that flights will be full. If the passengers you refer to are so price conscious, there will not be room to move on anything. So the airlines underwrite the flights and also give away free lift tickets? A sure recipe to haemorrhage cash.
Sorry but no that wont happen. Vail resorts are not so desparate to discount to such an extent. The party with the weakest bargaining power in this case would be the airline wanting a package.

One of the reasons why TC went under - they were too vertically integrated. They could not get better deals than the customers doing their own thing.

Again resorts and especially perisher has said many times that they are not a travel company and would prefer to do packages from within their own business units. such as lift and lesson, lift, lesson and ski hire.

 

[ozfflyer]

Haha that old chestnut - the assets are running anyway so why not let people use it on a cost neutral basis.

Sorry but no that wont happen. Vail resorts are not so desparate to discount to such an extent. The party with the weakest bargaining power in this case would be the airline wanting a package.

then the resorts of Falls/Hotham will remain fairly empty for Sept except weekends, which means they have to make all their revenue in about 8 or 9 weeks from end of June to end of August. End of June can be a bit iffy for snow. Vail has to do something, or they will become resorts for only those living within a few hours drive.

 

[ozfflyer]

Haha that old chestnut - the assets are running anyway so why not let people use it on a cost neutral basis.

Airlines do it but they restrict those fares in a very limited fare bucket on each flight.

You still have not explained who will guarantee that the flights will be cost neutral. What if the flights start losing money. Who covers that? Having cheap lift tickets is not a guarantee that flights will be full. If the passengers you refer to are so price conscious, there will not be room to move on anything. So the airlines underwrite the flights and also give away free lift tickets? A sure recipe to haemorrhage cash.
Sorry but no that wont happen. Vail resorts are not so desparate to discount to such an extent. The party with the weakest bargaining power in this case would be the airline wanting a package.

One of the reasons why TC went under - they were too vertically integrated.

Again resorts and especially perisher has said many times that they are not a travel company and would prefer to do packages from within their own business units. such as lift and lesson, lift, lesson and ski hire.

one certain way to get people to go to a ski resort is to offer free flights or free lift tickets. The perceived value is very high.

Didn't say skiers were price conscious, but everyone likes FREE, even if have lots of $$$.

You can give away free lift tickets or free flights & still break even on those components, as long as the non-free item is purchased. This can be a requirement. You can't ski with lift tickets & you have to get there somehow.

2 return flights a week might cost $80k not huge dollars. Plenty of other ways, as well that resort can package stuff, eg. rentals, meals, drinks. All things with a decent margin.

 

[p--and--t]

Given population, demographics and Australia's favourite holiday destination, why isn't there a NCLNTL-DPS flight ???? (nb: edited. I think NCL-DPS is well beyond the range of an A220).

The alternate "boganville" is a lot closer and well within range of an E195/A220. No competition on that route NTL-BUA

 

[Quickstatus]

Thats a feature of ski resorts the world over especially during the low season.

No but it's a given that the further you live away from an attraction, the more expensive it is to experience that attraction.

Anyway this is not the original thread anymore
But lemme know when you find such a package or direct flights.

 

[ozfflyer]

Thats a feature of ski resorts the world over especially during the low season.

No but it's a given that the further you live away from an attraction, the more expensive it is to experience that attraction.

Actually they already have done something by making low season skiing a lot cheaper compared to high season. But still it is as you say empty even with cheaper prices.

actually skiing in USA is cheaper for non-Americans, cos they factor in, that you have to come a long way & then stay longer.

Doesn't matter how cheap Falls/Hotham are if you can't get there easily. A nonstop flight under 2 hours, with express coaches waiting for flight & departing minutes after they arrive, then taking 2 hours to get there, so a little over 4 hours A to B. Quicker than ZQN, no passports, no customs/immigration, no foreign currency & no need to learn a foreign language (kiwi)