Finnair sees EX-YU market potential

Finland's national carrier says it sees potential in the growing former Yugoslav market, particularly among leisure travellers coming from Asia. As a result, the airline will boost frequencies within its limited network in the region and plans to operate up to eight weekly flights from Helsinki to Dubrovnik, five weekly to  Split, as well as two weekly services to Pula next summer. Furthermore, the airline will maintain its four weekly seasonal service to Ljubljana but says it is “carefully following” potential destinations in other countries in the region as competition from rival airlines continues to grow. Norwegian Air Shuttle now serves Dubrovnik, Split, Pula and Pristina out of the Finnish capital over the summer, while Croatia Airlines commenced seasonal flights between Zagreb and Helsinki this year.

Speaking to EX-YU Aviation News, Finnair Manager, Satu Haataja, said, "Slovenia and Croatia are very popular leisure destinations from Finland. A lot of the travel is point to point but we do see an increase in transfer traffic as well, those destinations are becoming increasingly popular among our Asian customers, particularly from Japan". The airline added, “The Croatian market serves as a great destination for Finnair customers both from Northern Europe and Asia. We have also seen increasing numbers of passengers from Croatia using Finnair on their trips. Demand for Croatian destinations has been growing year by year and we have increased our flights to the area consequently”.

Finnair’s Ljubljana service has also proven popular with travellers from Asia, with the Finnish carrier handling an average of over 30.000 passengers on the seasonal route each year. “Ljubljana is developing well and we hope that someday it will be feasible to operate there year round. We actively follow many markets where we could either increase frequencies or make them year round operations”, the airline said. The Oneworld alliance member, which has carved out a niche with direct flights to Asia, says future expansion in the former Yugoslavia will highly depend on demand from the Far East. “For the time being, the demand from our Asian units has been to Croatian coastal areas. However, when Asian tour operators create more products for the former Yugoslav area we want to be their first choice of airline and then it will be very important to have multiple entry and exit points such as Belgrade for example. At the same time we are following carefully the corporate travel market development to and from the area, because those travelling for work are one of our focus groups”.

Finnair flies between Asia, Europe and North America with an emphasis on fast connections via Helsinki, carrying more than ten million passengers annually. Its network connects nineteen cities in Asia and seven in North America with over 100 destinations in Europe.