Air Serbia is preparing to introduce its second destination in the United States next April with Chicago to be launched with a two weekly rotation. The carrier’s regional network, which is expected to be strengthened in the lead-up to its new transatlantic service, will play a key role in its success. “With the introduction of Belgrade - Chicago flights, for the first time after 32 years, the capital of Serbia will be directly connected to the American city where approximately 350.000 residents of Serbian origin reside, as well as a large number of those hailing from other countries of the former Yugoslavia and neighbouring Balkan states, which are, and will be, well-connected with Belgrade via the regional Air Serbia network”, the carrier said.
On Air Serbia’s existing long haul service between Belgrade and New York, 58% of travellers are transfers. Of those, 39% are transferring via Belgrade, while the remaining 19% do so via JFK Airport. In the pre-pandemic 2019, passengers flying from Podgorica to New York via Belgrade made the greatest proportion of transfers on the route. They were followed by those from Tirana, Skopje, Athens, Tel Aviv, Tivat, Thessaloniki, Zagreb, Ljubljana, Vienna, and Bucharest. Similar figures are expected for the upcoming Chicago service, with the airline also looking at attracting more connecting passengers from the Middle East and North Africa.
Among the former Yugoslav capitals, excluding Belgrade, data indicates that Zagreb has the most traffic to the Windy City. Lufthansa is the main carrier of choice for flights between the Croatian capital and Chicago, handling 20% of the market, followed by LOT Polish Airlines with 14% and British Airways with a 12% market share. Skopje followed Zagreb with the most travellers headed to Chicago, then Sarajevo, Podgorica and Ljubljana. The Windy City was the second busiest destination for travel in the United States from all former Yugoslav capitals after New York, with exception to Ljubljana, where it was third, behind both the Big Apple and San Francisco. Although Air Serbia does not serve Pristina, it had more travellers to Chicago than Podgorica.
There used to be a plan for them to fly double daily to all ex-Yu capital cities
ReplyDeleteWhich ex-Yu city do they have the most flights to after Tivat and Podgorica?
DeleteLjubljana
DeleteThey will definitely have to work on offering good connections across their network.
ReplyDeleteInteresting to see that New York got passengers from Tel Aviv!
ReplyDeleteVienna is the biggest surprise!
DeleteIt just goes to show that people will travel in any combination to save some money. And it doesn't matter if a certain city has multiple nonstop flights to a certain city, you can still be competative as an airline if you try.
Delete^ exactly! In contrast to what people in the comments say here.
DeleteThis is absolutely true! I'm flying to Sydney from BEG via Zurich and Abu Dhabi next month only because that ticket was $300-400 cheaper than what other airlines offered. When you're in your twenties you don't sit on piles of cash and there are a lot of us like that. haha
DeleteMakes sense. Everyone does it
DeleteNO. On every aircraft there are passengers paying different amount of money for their flight. Some with pay really a lot, then there is a group paying less, but still a lot, then a group paying a moderate amount, a group paying little and finally a group flying more or less for a bargain.
DeleteThe profitability and therefore sustainability of the route depends on this mix. How many passengers of the different groups and how much passenger from a given group actually pays (especially the high paying ones).
If you have onboard only the last group, as an airline you will lose a lot of money despite having a full plane. Charge 1 EUR and you will always have a full plane but no money.
The success of the route is determined by the number of passengers paying for direct flights high tariffs, but also passengers paying high transfer tariffs. The legacy business is all about getting such passengers.
You may have onboard passengers that in order to pay low price will be happy to transfer three times and wait each time 10 hours overnight, but this will not bring you as an airline money. For an airline it is better to have that dime than not, but this is only an addition to the money you need to make on better paying passengers. Or otherwise it is not sustainable.
It is a pity that exyuaviation does not show us stats concerning pricings on different routes (if is available to exyuaviation in the access it purchased to the stats).
Pricing is the biggest secret in aviation business, and nobody would reveal details. However there are some common sence works that could be done; lease, admin,advertisment costs, maintanance insurance plus operational like kerosene, overflight and airport taxes, crew, hotels and all that divide by number of flights/seat count and you would get an idea of how much money that seat needs to bring…thsn include LF, seasonality and historic data and you will be closer…
DeleteI wonder if we might get their A319 in SKP when ORD is announced? At least on days when the flights operate.
ReplyDeleteDo they not use A319 to SKP anymore?
DeleteNo, ATR has been sent for many years now.
DeleteThanks. Shame
DeleteA319 will be sent once there are enough passangers for a319! If there are 50 pasengers - of course ATR will be sent!
DeleteOU is able to send an A319 out to SKP, I don't see how JU can't. JU has a much larger network on offer. We saw yesterday that some of SKP's top underserved destinations are actually in the JU network.
DeleteIf tickets weren't starting at 13.000 din without luggage maybe they would attract more of the O&D market. A319 would help distribute the flight costs over more seats, enabling them to have more competitive fares.
There is a highway all the way from Skoplje to Belgrade and it takes 4h to get there. Skoplje to Zagreb is about 8 hours.
DeleteOU sends the A319 because of cargo. If you look at the article from the other day about SKP, BEG is ahead of ZAG in terms of passengers. It means they get to carry more passengers with the ATR than OU with high density A319.
Delete@13,23
DeleteThere is also a highway to Vienna and we have up to 5 flights a day.
Zagreb is closer and had similar frequencies to SKP.
Not everyone drives. Bus to Skoplje is between 6 and a half to 8 and a half hours. Throw in fares starting at 5.500-6.500 din return and loads will increase.
@13,40
I read the article. The numbers were for last year when JU had more frequencies to SKP. Prior to the pandemic it was OU that had more passengers, larger capacity and more frequencies. It is quite possible that this year it will be back to OU being better in SKP.
Can't wait for the flights to begin!
ReplyDeleteI think that Chicago will turn out even more successful than New York.
ReplyDeleteI still can't help but feel that they would have had more traffic had they launched Toronto
ReplyDeleteI'm certain they will eventually launch Toronto too. They are not stupid. There is probably a good reason why Chicago is coming first
DeleteWell O’Hare is a giant hub for American and United so there is great potential for codeshare agreement with either of the airlines. Meanwhile Toronto is the hub of Air Canada and Westjet, which have much smaller networks than either American or United.
DeleteI think Beirut was also strong from New York.
ReplyDeleteI also think that all the Italian destinations they now fly to could be attractive to American passengers.
DeleteWow SFO busier from LJU than ORD. That's a surprise.
ReplyDeleteAir Serbia is getting back on the original plans from 2013 of making Belgrade regional hub, but this time more carefully, with more balanced approach.
ReplyDeleteThey were always on that track, no? But the time and circumstances like COVID made them focus on some other aspects of the business.
DeleteAfter Turkish airlines and Aegean, Air Serbia is positioning itself as third biggest Balkan airline.
ReplyDeleteIn what terms air serbia is third largest airline in Balkans ? Passengers traffic , number of destinations , revenue ? Do not forget Blue air and Tarom .
DeleteRomania is not part of the Balkan peninsula (except for a very small part in the southeast of the country that doesn't include any major airports).
DeleteIn 2019, passenger numbers were slightly higher with RO (around 200.000). RO had 3 or 4 extra aircraft as well. RO also had roughly 4 times larger losses compared to JU (35.8 million Euros vs 9.5 million. JU has more destinations.
DeleteThe only thing Blue Air was better in was profit. It actually made money (15 million Euros).
It is quite possible that next year JU can overtake RO in both passenger numbers and fleet size.
We also have to mension Skyexpress Greece , they might surpass Air serbia in a year .
DeleteWhy not offet Antalya and say Heraklion as scheduled routes during summer. It would be packed with Americans.
ReplyDelete*offer
DeleteBecause Americans will choose American carriers and travel through Athens where Delta, American and United are expanding really fast. They are not gonna go to HER or any other Greek island through BEG.
DeleteYou’d be surprised.
DeleteAir Serbia is going to bring a lot of transfer passengers to Adriatic coast.
ReplyDeleteTaking in consideration JU flies to TIV, DBV, SPU, ZAD, PUY and RJK it is obvious Air Serbia is using its potential to make successful business based on airports in Croatia and Montenegro.
You are forgetting their growing presence in Albania and Greece!
DeleteHow are they growing their presence in Greece?
DeleteI don't think they can make decent transfer times for some of those destinations. The layovers would be too long.
DeleteJU is growing on the Croatian market. We can expect more frequencies to follow. SPU and DBV could start having a second daily frequency on some days, perhaps a morning rotation to connect onto the long haul flights. SPU and DBV miss some connections to the Balkan region as well where JU could be an attractive transfer point. It would be great to see either SPU or DBV move away from being seasonal routes and flown year round, at least with a couple of flights a week on an ATR.
DeleteGreece has kind of taken a step back at JU. It isn't too drastic but still a step back. There has been talk of a third route to Greece in the past, Ionnina in particular. There is definitely some room for JU to expand in Greece.
Several weekly flights with the atr in summer to Corfu would be appreciated !
DeleteI even suggest them to go daily after some years .
The atrs are the perfect aircraft for that kind of destination .
Not only Corfu there are plenty cities in Greece with so many Serbian tourists that can support JU flights , KVA, VOL, KLX, HER, RHO, CHQ, even IOA, AXD and VOL
DeleteAnyone know what is the likely schedule for ORD flights?
ReplyDeleteSimilar to New York.
DeleteORD fights are longer, aren't they?
DeleteYes, by about an hour.
DeleteAnd this is just the first phase. Soon, more new routes will be announced :)
ReplyDelete2023 will be a great year for BEG.
DeleteThey should surpass pre-Covid numbers in my opinion.
DeleteYes probably around 7 million pax in 2023.
DeleteFingers crossed
DeleteNow the hard work begins in making Chicago sustainable.
ReplyDeleteI think it will become profitable much quicker than JFK.
DeleteWhy? Not saying it won't just wondering what makes it different from JFK
DeleteWell, first of all, JU had much better regional network with a lot of midnight/zero wave flightd that arrive to BEG just in time to catch JFK/Chicago flights comparing to 2016 when JFK was announced.
DeleteAlso, JU is now well established and reliable on TATL flights so as soon as flights are available for bookings I asume they will have LF of more than 90% all the time.
Transfers will be arround 60% for sure, thanks to great regional coverage
Wonder what the cargo potential is on this route.
ReplyDeleteI mean ORD route.
DeleteIf they have a lot of cargo to New York, Chicago should be no different.
DeleteI've had four packages delivered from US thru New York. Until China flights start I'm ordering from the States.
DeleteHow long do they take to arrive?
DeleteFirst they should increase frequencies on almost all ex-Yu routes.
ReplyDeleteASAP
DeleteBring back TLV. If it was a good feeder for JFK it will be for ORD too.
ReplyDeleteIstanbul will provide feeding passengers too. Mark my words.
ReplyDeleteChicago has huge ex-yu and Albanian and Bulgarian diaspora
ReplyDeleteA second destination in Bulgaria would be needed .
DeleteIdeal would be Varna, which is Bulgarias summer capital .
What combinations to passengers from Chicago primarily use to reach BEG and vice verse?
ReplyDelete"The Lufthansa Group handled the majority of travellers between Belgrade and Chicago, with Lufthansa and Swiss International Air Lines each transporting 25% of all passengers on the route. They were followed by LOT Polish Airlines with 10% of the market, Turkish Airlines with 7%, as well as Air France with a 7% share."
Deletehttps://www.exyuaviation.com/2022/07/air-serbia-to-launch-chicago-boost-new.html
Missed that. Thank you!
DeleteAir Serbia really needs to join one of the three major alliances if they want more North America flyers and destinations.
ReplyDeleteAgree!
DeleteAny alliance would be more than welcome. In that way JU would widen network and more important get access to more business class travellers willing to pay premium prices.
Deletewhy hasn't JU joined any alliance yet?
DeleteI guess no one invited them
DeleteI'm sure someone would if they showed interest, which they haven't.
DeleteI think you have to pay a lot of money on an annual basis to be part of an alliance.
Delete19% transfer at JFK w/o an alliance. Pretty good.
DeleteTrue not bad
DeleteOnce the flights are established and serious LF are evident, there will be a lot of discussions with other airlines to work out mutually beneficial arrangements. Besides the direct benefit to JU and BEG, there will be a significant impact financially in Serbia (tourism, trade, diplomacy).
DeleteDiplomacy?
Delete@09,55
DeleteAF and OK invited Jat Airways to join SkyTeam many years ago but nothing came of it.
https://www.exyuaviation.com/2009/09/jat-to-join-skyteam.html?m=1
Ključ uspeha ove linije biće povezanost sa regionalnim letovima ZAG,TIA,POD,SKP...
ReplyDeletePOD?
DeleteTGD
DeleteМа какви. Кључ успеха ће бити повезивање са Атином, Истанбулом, Солуном, Букурештом... сви имају много већу потражњу него аеродроми широм бивше Југославије. Ер Србија не размишља регионално-паланачки већ гледа на ситуацију много шире.
DeleteYet region-palanka fills JFK flights more than mentioned markets. Why would Istanbul work for 2pw ORD while missing to do so for 6pw JFK?
DeleteHow do you know it's not providing transfers? The cities mentioned in the article clearly state it is for 2019. JU was not flying to IST until December 2019.
DeleteПаланка их пуни јер има више летова. Потенцијал је много већи изван ове регије и то ће се осетити тек када ЈУ буде имала нормалну мрежу.
DeleteFirst thing first. They are yet to become top regional player.
DeleteDecreasing prices for P2P would help
DeleteBEG's catchment area will greatly help fill these seats.
ReplyDeleteThe problem is that if they want to be preffered they should be much cheaper from the other carriers , something that means they could not be profitable - the same as New York - for at least 5 years !
ReplyDeleteProfitability isn't achieved only based on ticket value. There are many factors in play.
DeleteThe only other factor is gargo , what are the rest ??
DeleteAncillary income.
DeletePecalba express.
ReplyDeleteIntroducing direct to ORD will be amazing and very lucrative as JU will catch transit pax from whole region.
ReplyDeleteWith good price i.e 500€ this flight will be full in high season
ReplyDeleteAIr Serbia should not start flying to Chicago if people are not ready to pay more in high season. You cannot compare direct flights with flights with one or more transfers.
Delete500 eur is not realistic, no one flies over the ocean for that money these days. It's enough to start with competitors' prices or slightly above for P2P and slightly under for transfers.
DeleteTP is selling fares from MXP to the US for 320€ return for next winter. Not saying that JU should match that, but outside of high season it's never been cheaper to fly trans-Atlantic.
DeleteWhat's the next long hual route we can expect?
ReplyDeleteToronto
DeleteToronto and Guangzhou/Shenzhen
DeleteGuangzhou/Shenzhen and Shanghai.
DeleteShanghai and Beijing.
DeleteBeijing and Hong Kong.
Delete@Anon 16:19 Where did you get Hong Kong?!
DeleteThere is some direct demand for BEG (and region) - HKG
DeleteEh, some is not that much.
DeleteI vote for introducing LAX, YYZ and MIA with 2x p/w each.
ReplyDeleteMIA and LAX are coming with introduction of fourth A330 in SS24.
Delete@Anon 12:00 Do you work at JU? How do you know?
DeleteHe's pulling your tail.
DeleteWhen do you think the time for flights between belgrade and pristina will be possible?
ReplyDeleteThe agreement is signed 2-3 years ago...
DeleteThey need to adjust the schedule in such a way to enable good connections with flights arriving from Russia, plenty of Russians will use these flights while Aeroflot is not in business. They used to have double daily JFK, 4 x weekly LAX and MIA and daily IAD.
ReplyDeleteWell, the "sweet problem" with russian flights is that they connect to so many other JU routes that it makes no sence to rearrange them in order to synchronize them with two other flights. Look, Sochi and Moscow are good to go, they connect easily on departing flights to JFK but on arrival they need to wait few hours in BEG.
DeleteToo bad JU does not offer "daily excursions" for people that have long connections, could make sence
There's museum near the airport where one can easily spend two hours but it's not promoted to the level there's no single sign inside the airport building. Weird and bad.
DeleteBecause Vinci doesn't have interest to send people to the next building, they don't get penny of it. They want people to spend time shopping boring brands like at the every other boring airport. The owner should step in and give some cut Vinci over there, food and baverage, storage units... Let them get money just let us have some nice things.
DeleteJU can gift free museum ticket to every passenger with >3h transfer at BEG, isn't that great added value of low (or no) cost for JU? And maybe the reason for someone to choose BEG over WAW next time?
good points.
Delete@Anon 18:52 That’s a good idea! Another thing would be to make something at BEG airport, similar to IST, SIN, etc. It isn’t very realistic, but…
Deleteby “make something” I mean something attractive.
DeleteWhat do you mean 'make something'?
DeleteSomething at the airport to make it attractive, like, a garden, etc….
DeleteThis is BEG, not some mega Asian airport we talkin' about.
DeleteBilo bi interesantno videti koliko je od 19% transfernih putnika na JFK nastavilo ka ORD. Još uvek nisu ulistali zimski red letenja za JFK,mogli bi brže da ažuriraju svoju web stranicu.
ReplyDeleteChicago will be a great addition and will be profitable much quicker than JFK. But forget about LAX. Jet Blue has been trying to secure a gate in LAX since their inception.Air Serbia cannot afford LAX nor are there any gates available
ReplyDeleteDo we have any idea what the flight numbers for additional long-haul would be?
ReplyDeleteI'm assuming they will use the same flight number that JAT used for Chicago. JU506/507
DeleteWould be nice.
DeleteI feel Shanghai and Beijing would be left to Chinese carriers and JU would serve additionals. It would be a wicked move. Take cargo heavy routes where lack of passengers can be easily compensated and simultaneously grab a piece of cake.
ReplyDeleteSmart comment. Hainan started Beijing-Belgrade and Air China is likely to start Shanghai. That leaves TSN and another unserved destination for Air Serbia, possibly Guangzhou. What CAN lacks in passenger demand from Belgrade would be offset by cargo.
DeleteThis is where third Air Serbia A330 would come in handy during 2023 or early 2024. Not to expand to new destination like Toronto but to grow frequencies to existing destinations JFK, ORD, TSN and possibly CAN. I can't see Air Serbia launching YYZ or any other long haul destination before getting 4th A330 and that might take at least 4-5 years.
If I were them I would increase frequencies to Sofia, Bucharest, Thessaloniki, Dubrovnik & Split (make the last two year round). Ideally up the capacity to Sarajevo, Tirana, Zagreb, Skopje & Ljubljana (use A319s) and then introduce Budapest, Krakow, Pristina (if possible), Tel Aviv, Amman & Cairo. Goes without saying that they have to get the scheduling right so that all of these can feed both USA destinations. TIV & TGD are fine as is I'd say.
ReplyDeleteI think TGD could do with a midnight rotation. Something that will get back to BEG around 0530 in time for the first wave.
Delete80/20 "rule" means Podgorica, Tirana and Skopje probably generate 80% transfers to JFK and so will ORD. Depending on slots they are getting at ORD it might require some timing tweaks on those Air Serbia key feeder routes but I don't see the need to go crazy with all regional destinations.
DeleteIf I'm not wrong, TGD is closed during night so JU can't do such rotation.
Delete@George - well, if you look at their timetable you will see that they mostly cover whole region with morning wave. Plus Sochi and Moscow. Their latest "night arrival" is Moscow at 06:20 and before that they have 8-9 morning arrivals between 05:00-05:30 to perfectly fit in their "morning wave". This morning wave can be increased (send A319 instead of ATR) but lets take it easy. Additional A330 will generate additional 250 demand seats for daily departures, it is NOT as much as it looks like
DeleteI hope they start MBX soon.
ReplyDeleteFrom the latest Chicago census, top 5 nationalities.
ReplyDeleteIrish: (201,836)
German: (200,392)
Polish: (179,868)
Italian: (96,599)
English: (60,307)
Those 350 thousand Serbs must have all been away on census night.
You have no clue how census data is collected in the US and you can see that a change in the census question resulted in a huge decline in people declaring themselves as Serbs in previous two census.
DeleteSame as there is only 2% of Serbs and 1.6% of Bosniaks in Slovenia if you look at the last census numbers :)
DeleteWhen will ORD tickets go on sale?
ReplyDeleteJU already has a good network .
ReplyDeleteTheir next goal should be an expansion of frequencies .
Twice a week Madrid or Sochi are obviously a joke .
Guys is it me or did JU silently boost Sochi? I see three weekly in their system.
ReplyDeleteYes they have. Huge demand !
DeleteFlight number? Guess JU 502?
ReplyDelete