ff_flyer

Indian market has never really materialized for AY and probably never will.
"Real J seats" is my wet dream, particularly after just having flown 10 sectors on MH and PG on 320/738 recliners, but cargo capacity on 6+ hours on 321 is very limited and they would never tie their hands and make the switch to a fixed J/Y configuration. Never in the foreseeable future, IMHO.

intuition

The A319 fleet is 16 y.o. on average, the A320 is 14 y.o. Sure, they will fly many more years, but IIRC they talked about narrowbody renewal in the near future. Maybe that has changed, especially if they are pouring money into them by rebuilding the cabins. Old planes with more seats - a flyers dream!

Very interesting info, all of it.


Personally, I find the E90 OK. It flies very well and unless 100% loadfactor I prefer it over A320 on the intra-nordic flights. A320 J is absolutely nothing to write home about.

I too drool over real J seats in AY narrowbodies. But there is no way we are going to see that.

mosburger

Anyone care to do a point-to-point comparison on f.ex AY and CX in J on the, say, DUS - ICN and FRA - PVG routes?

Beginning with the first leg either in CX 359 or 777 Cirrus full flats compared to AY "high density but middle seat blocked" 321.

We could of course replace CX with EK, QR or TK...

Courmisch

Anticipating the AirBerlin take-over maybe?

I understand northeastern Asia to mean China, the Koreas and maybe Japan (though I don't see AY flying to DPRK anytime soon).

ff_flyer

The shorthaul decision is a strategic issue and AY will most probably stick to Airbus in its own fleet. More flexibility to operate A319/A32(X)/A330/A350 with cross-qualified cockpit (CCQ) crews when needed. E90 is more complex, perhaps E190-E2 or something else. Current fleet is fairly new (~10 yrs) but has a very low second market value but on the other hand can be operated with no additional capital reserves for many years.
Personally I hate E90 because of the seat which will just not fit my a*se due to low seat height and the lack of space with high cabin load factors.

intuition

A very condensed comparison on DUS-ICN, sorted on price on a random date in far future is:


KE 2795€
E90->CDG
388->ICN
15:20 avg time


CX 2900€
359->HKG
773->ICN
17:40 avg time


AY 3333€
320->HEL
359->ICN
14:10 avg time


Finnair fastest and expensive. KE uses the beloved E90. CX has surprisingly long flight time.

intuition

I am sure you are right - all Airbus fleet is a big pro.

It seems E195-E2 has a fuel burn per seat on par with A319 neo, while a E90 has almost twice the burn. If that is an important factor, current embraers are unlikely to stick around if/when Airbuses are coming in.

(But Finnair didn't go with neo's did they?)

WilcoRoger

AY pricing is surprising - 3,3k for ex-EU->Asia?? Wow!

CX is long, because HKG is way down south from ICN, so first you make your way south and then up north - nearly 3000km more than via HEL!

KE is just 800km more than AY due to backtracking westwards to CDG.

mosburger

Wow! Thank you for the effort, very interesting!

This coincides with the general theme, alas AY only being competitive through fast flying times and not because of comfort or service related to the hard product.

We all know that the AY soft product can range from indifferent to truly wonderful when there is an experienced purser and a friendly crew around.

But as the hard product on European feeders is soon among the worst if not the worst of any legacy airline in Europe, the only way to attract more customers is to put a focus on regional airports with no direct connections to Asia.

Which leads us back to the original claim regarding the German market by Justinus.

Justinus

Personally I use regularly the flight to/from DEL, always in J. Sometimes J class is truly crowded with no seats free, sometimes we are only a few pax. However, AY has increased its capacity and is according to some rumors considering restarting some flights to BOM. (One of the main problems on the Indian market is that AY does not have a local feeder, since none of the Indian airlines is a member of Oneworld.)

If AY used a 321 on this leg, it would have absolutely no success on the Indian market. DEL has got good connections to everywhere including HEL (now also QR via DOH) - and all these are widebody planes with full flat J seats.

However, I have always wondered why AY cannot provide one or two of its 321s with full flat J seats and use these planes to destinations like DXB, TLV and so on. Some of the smaller AA planes do have such a J class section.

Jainzar

Just select the right random date.

Gnopps

With HEL-CPH being my most frequent route I'm happy to see this. SK seems to be cutting down on departures (3-5 per day) whereas AY now has (4-7 per day).

Finnair's schedule also makes more sense. On Saturdays they depart from HEL between 0730 to 1800. SAS' departures on the other hand are at 0640, 1530 and 2305!

intuition

Haha, indeed!

I did the quick comparison on a OTA because I needed to see the entire market offer. In fact, I think I did use OCT10 as my departure date (how random can that be if two people chose it for the same purpose?!?) but I guess I had a later return making the AY price skyrocket.


Yes, I was surprised too by the price, AY usually competes on price in markets where their brand is weak.

intuition

On one hand, I can't really blame them for using the "short flighttime" as their marketing thing. They did identify this as a unique pro to their business and so they should build the brand around that.
On the other hand, I am not really sure flyers are that concerned in general. The most price-sensitive still accepts long layovers and the really frequent flyer appreciates quality service with consistency over flighttime (as long as it is not overly long). Schedule is also a major factor.

As for the shorthaul fleet it seems clear AY is currently aiming for better yields by high density and thus we will not see any improvements in hard product for a long time if ever. Perhaps they are having a hard time to decide weather or not the shorthaul fleet is indeed a separate operation and thus competing with DY (no J) and SK (ludicrous J) or if it is an integral part of the longhaul business.

I'm guessing they are not selling many EU O/D standalone J tickets. The response should IMHO not be to make EU J crappier but instead focus on the SH as a part of LH operations.

Real J seats to the connecting people!

WilcoRoger

Would make perfect sense - bmi had those nice A321s to ME destinations with full flat seats (now BA flies them). Or even old-school business class seats would make an enermous difference on such mid-haul destinations. Let's be realistic - on a 4-5-6 hrs flight full flat is nice, but not really needed. Look at TK's short haul C product.