Saudi Arabian carrier flynas has announced the suspension of its three times weekly link between Jeddah and Manchester with effect from August 1, 2014, but the low-cost carrier says it remains committed to the UK market. In fact this weekend it will introduce a new Riyadh – London Gatwick service to complement its existing Jeddah – London Gatwick operation.
The carrier launched its long-haul operations in April, adding a new dimension to its flight offering and providing the first major local competition to national carrier Saudi Arabian Airlines (Saudia). However, it appears not all its routes are meeting initial expectations and despite high hopes for the Manchester route flynas has found it hard to compete with Saudia, which reintroduced its own non-stop flights on the Jeddah – Manchester route earlier this year.
flynas launched its own flights between Jeddah and Manchester on May 2, 2014 offering a hybrid business model which it described as Low-Cost Carrier Plus, offering customers added value on its Airbus A330-200s wet-leased from ACMI provider HiFly. It believed this route would especially appeal to Saudi students heading to the UK for higher education as Manchester University is a popular choice for Saudi students studying Petroleum, Mechanical, Aerospace, Civil and Electrical Engineering and Medicine.
“flynas has suspended its three-times weekly Jeddah – Manchester service effective August 1, 2014 due to commercial reasons,” said Raja Azmi, chief executive officer, flynas in response to our blog, Airline Route, breaking news on the route closure (see 'flynas ends Manchester service from early-August 2014'). “Load factor on the route has not met the company’s initial expectations,” he added.
“At flynas, we are always reviewing our route network to enhance operational efficiency and ensure that we continue to deliver value for money and an exceptional guest experience,” he concluded.
The closure of the Manchester operation will enable flynas to concentrate its activities at London Gatwick. It launched a twice weekly flight from Jeddah on April 8, 2014 and will launch a twice weekly service from Riyadh on July 27, 2014. The airline hopes to capitalise on the high-traffic Eid holiday period over the launch week of operations for the new route.
According to UK tourism agency VisitBritain, by 2020 Saudi Arabia is predicted to have the highest projected value percentage growth (181 per cent) amongst the twenty major and emerging markets in the world. The country also features among the top five highest spending markets for Britain, with an average spend per visit of £2,354 compared to an all-visitor average of £600 per visit.
London continues to top the lists of most popular European holiday destinations for individuals from the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, in addition to being a key hub for business travel. As an inbound destination, Saudi Arabia in turn continues to command a large share of religious tourism from the UK’s resident Muslim population.
In our analysis, below, we look more closely at bi-directional O&D demand between Saudi Arabia and the UK, highlighting which airports in each nation had the greatest flows of passengers between the countries. The data shows that demand has grown 6.8 per cent since the start of the decade to over 570,000 passenger a year with growth of 4.2 per cent in 2013 when compared with the previous year.
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