Originally Posted by
dontsh00t
Anyway, this is just my own curiosity. I would have thought that EK would try to feature the new F on their longest haul and most lucrative premium markets, but it seems like they're mostly being used for ~6-7h flights to Europe.
I think lots of things possibly wrong with the assumptions here.
- Firstly, longer doesn’t mean more lucrative. Sure a JFK-DXB ticket costs more than a GVA-DXB, but does it cost at least twice as much? If not, it’s probably not more lucrative unless much higher load factor, as EK can use the same frame for two return Europe flights in less than the time it takes to fly to JFK once and back.
- A lot of the markets they have chosen probably are high margin with lots of wealthy people and high ticket prices relative to distance, like ZRH, GVA, NRT etc. Don’t forget there are only 6 seats in new F, so EK seem to be focusing on routes where they will basically never need more than 6 seats but have a good chance of selling at least some of those seats for high prices.
- Finally, EK’s ‘most lucrative’ routes are probably the slot constricted ones that can also consistently sell out all 14 seats in A380 F with paying passengers, thinking of LHR and SYD here. EK needs to operate the biggest possible planes on these routes to maximise number of passengers. Why would EK switch these routes to a smaller plane with fewer seats just to be able to offer new F?
I think there is definite logic to where they are being deployed, it’s not random.