Air Serbia will maintain scheduled flights to eighty destinations in Europe, North America, Asia and Africa this summer, overtaking the number of scheduled destinations served by JAT Yugoslav Airlines in its final year of normal operations prior to the break-up of the former Yugoslavia. At the time, JAT served 75 scheduled destinations within its network, including 44 points in Europe, North Africa and the Middle East, fourteen long haul destinations, and seventeen domestic destinations. The Serbian carrier is making a big leap this summer with the introduction of 22 cities into its network. This will be accompanied by a number of charter flights, primarily to Turkey, but also Egypt and Greece.
The new additions to the airline’s network are said to be selling well, with destinations previously operated as charters being snapped up by tour operators and selling out. Lisbon, which was only recently announced as a new route for the carrier has also seen strong sales. Budapest, which has been allocated the largest number of frequencies among its new routes, reaching a peak of seventeen weekly from April onwards, has been revised down for its March launch. The airline will initially operate ten instead of fifteen weekly services next month. However, Air Serbia noted last week that it will optimise its operations to the Hungarian capital in the beginning but that it “strongly” believes the route will work.
Following the major expansion of its summer network, the Serbian carrier is targeting the densification of its existing services with the addition of more frequencies. The airline has so far already revealed it will be adding more flights to Zagreb, Skopje, Tirana, Pula, Larnaca, Barcelona, Rome, Vienna, Prague, Bologna, Madrid and Dusseldorf this summer, with extra services to be introduced on more destinations in the coming period. “Our expectations for 2023 are high. We plan to carry over three million passengers, with more than 30% being transferred (compared to 25% in 2022). We continue to work on new opportunities to be regularly added to our network”, the carrier’s CEO, Jiri Marek, recently said. The airline previously noted that its aggressive growth strategy for this summer is justified on the back of a strong winter which has operationally performed above all expectations.
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Purchased a ticket last night BEG-BUD-BEG for 17,000 RSD around 140 euros (with luggage) for next month.
ReplyDeleteThis route is definitely not for point to point passengers.
DeleteYes I assume they are targeting transfers but to be honest I could not be bothered going with Gea or Terra Travel and wasting my whole day. This way I'm going to be able to arrive in Budapest in the morning and be back in Belgrade a few days later in the evening.
DeleteWould you consider the price expensive or cheap?
DeleteI think it is ok. I purchased the ticket without any promo offer and 2 weeks before the flight.
DeleteLet us know the loads when you fly there!
DeleteIt's competitive, Terra return is 80eur
DeleteThose minibus journeys can be particularly long if they have a few passengers and pick you up first. One summer when I was going with them to BUD I was the first to be picked up and we spent over an hour going around Belgrade picking up people (and waiting for them to come down from their apartment).
DeleteOh and we also had to stop in central Novi Sad and then Subotica to pick up another two people.
DeleteFlying is without doubt the best option and also away to avoid land border check which can be tedious and long at times.
DeleteIf the initial price of the tickets was around 100e, it means that the flights are slowly filling up.
DeleteCould be. Should add that this had a small discount involved because I have a registered account on airserbia.com
DeleteMinibuses are cheap assuming it takes you door to door, so o commuting is needed if your destination is within Budapest. Used it several times on business. However its the least comfortable wau to travel. These minivans have a cargo suspension on the rear axle, and unlike real car you feel every imperfection of the road surface. You feel very tired, unless you are lucky to sit next to the driver who has a more comfy seat and is positioned over its way softer front axle. Definitely the best thing between Belgrade and Budapest would be the train. One day when high speed train commences, air service BEG-BUD will cease.
DeleteIt woun`t cease, because it is primarilly for connecting passengers, and the train to Budapest is not going to stop by the airport. And if one needs to catch it in Yemun at best - let alone in New Belgrade - that does not make a swift connection.
DeleteZemun.
DeleteAnonymous09:30
DeleteThere are regular buses that take you to Budapest in about 5h including border control (on a regular day). Return ticket is about 5000rsd, departure times are pretty decent and buses are pretty good for a medium long trip.
Comparing that to at least 100e return with JU, airport transfer times, check in, security, boarding etc. you can save only about an hour or so if you pick a plane.
JU can either go full LCC (to offer tickets for the price of a bus ticket the way Wizz and FR do on INI-VIE route) on this route or just reduce it to the level of satisfying transfer passengers since we all see that the sales are not doing that well. However, I did check some random tickets BUD via BEG and they are pretty reasonably priced, good connection times and sometimes even cheaper that other legacy carriers. I hope AS can do some aggressive marketing in Hungary so that people know that is an option since many ppl in general don`t know about JU or services and connections they offer. Thats the case even in Serbia, where they still have a reputation of a rip off unprofessional government company, which JU stopped being for many years now.
There are billboards around Belgrade advertising 49€ one way trip.
Delete5 hours by bus.
1 hour by plane.
Good marketing, wonder are they doing it in Budapest too?
maxi449212:34 that came out pretty recently actually....
DeleteExciting year ahead.
ReplyDeleteI agree. I don't think there has ever been a year with so many developments in Serbian aviation as this one, maybe only in 2013 when JU was relaunching under new name.
DeleteIt's fitting considering it's the 10th anniversary since the relaunch :)
DeleteMakes sense that previous charters are most popular. I wonder if they will ever be able to launch Antalya as scheduled route.
ReplyDeleteThey will only be able to launch it if they let TK fly it as well.
DeleteI wouldn't be surprised to see AYT become a year round scheduled route served by both JU and TK, with JU adding charters for the peak summer season. Perhaps next year along with 1 other Turkish route.
DeleteTurkish wanted to start this route a year ago, year-round too.
DeleteThey will easily reach 100 destinations in 2-3 years.
ReplyDelete+1
DeleteNot to be negative, but they are running out of destinations that are close and can be profitable.
DeleteBut they should be able to pull off 100+ destinations by their 100 birthday.
@maxi4492
DeleteThere are still quite a few routes that have somewhat of O&D demand. What helps is the transfer possiblities via BEG which help boost loads and the destination count.
Take Kazan for example. Little O&D demand yet it's a JU destination. As JU grows so will the destination possibilities.
So it took 32 years for a national ex-Yu airline to overtake JAT's destination count.
ReplyDeleteYes. But their intercontinental network is still significantly smaller than the old JU.
DeleteYes, 32 years, a civil war, NATO bombing, international sanctions and 23 years of political and economic transition. Given all that they did pretty well. JU management in the 1990s and early 2000s did a good job. Things started to go south after 2005/2006.
DeleteOne of them, dont remember that JAT operated in whole Yugoslavia not only Serbia.
DeleteAnd a country that counts 6m people instead of ex-Ju's 22m. Not bad at all.
DeleteThe next step will be overtaking old JAT's passenger numbers. I think it can be done in around 2 years.
DeleteWhat was the passenger record?
Delete4,531,000 pax
DeleteThanks. Will take some time to beat that though
DeleteThey are on the right track
Delete7 million, not six and closer to ten in reality (Serbian people).
DeleteNumber of population is irrelevant, but the catchment area.
@09,16
DeleteAll of JAT's intercontinental destinations were linked with other destinations which is why the destination count is high. Not to mention that they were mostly served with low frequencies. It was the norm back then, but certainly isn't today.
@09,25
I don't think it can be done in 2 years or less. 3 at the earliest.
Good job Air Serbia and I hope they will reduce the delays this time .
ReplyDeleteYes, today the midnight flights had several delays of one hour or more and the summer has not year arrived.
DeleteIt may have been as a result of bad weather last night
DeleteI flew yesterday BEG-SVO (YU-APO) and we had a 2 hrs delay leaving Belgrade. We were seated in the plane without any information for about 1.5 hrs before we pushed back then about 30 min until for de-icing before take off. No information at all neither from cockpit nor cabin staff. With a full flight toilets were closed and passengers complaining, crew very mediocre. Overall impression was poor. 5cm of snow in February created chaos so that tells you how ready airport and airline are.
DeleteIf you sat for 2 hours in a plane that is ready to take off, it means that they were waiting for approval from Russian air traffic control to take off.
DeleteYou are writing nonsense about Russian air traffic control, if the flight has a pre-approved slot then you are free to enter the airspace and russian ATC takes over the flight once you get into it's zone of control. The AC door was open at the gate, supervisor coming in and out and finally waiting for the push back tractor. BEG / JU mess!
DeleteYou definitely didn't wait 2 hours for a push back tractor to arrive. The person isn't writing nonsense. The fact that you were all boarded and waiting means there was some issue related to the flight itself. There are such things as ATC constraints on the routing etc
DeleteAnd he is not honest . There was a delay on thar flight but not 2 hrs as he claims in his comment, plus there was annoucment soon as everyone was border about ATC delay. He sounds very miserable or did not pay any attention on the flight and now blaming JU.
Delete@11:34 does 105 min make you feel better? Realy a much improved record!?? Ok appologies for 2 hrs mentioned and again no there was no announcements made and it has nothing to do with being miserable or not but rather to do with the fact that I havent had a single flight in out of Svo with Ju for the past 10 years that went
Deleteon time. You can cheerlead, defend and hope but the fact is that their operations sucks. On 1 Ju flight I accumulate more delay than with Aeroflot over a full year of flying.
So if Jat had 14 long haul destinations and Air Serbia currently only has three (Chicago is scheduled for the spring), that means that there is the potential for another eleven long haul routes. Although Sydney and Melbourne may not be on the horizon any time soon, I think two more cities in China, as well as Miami and Toronto are a strong possibility within the next twelve months.
ReplyDeleteI think those 4 are realistic and will probably happen sooner rather than later.
Delete@09:25, the ceo of air serbia said that Toronto is unlikely, because they need two way traffick. the diaspora in canada only travel to ex-yu at start of summer and all return at the end. Canada in general does not have enough business or leisure connection with serbia or any ex-yu country.
DeleteYugoslavia was a big country with many international relationships in business and leisure, Serbia doesn't have them.
But they could do Australia and New Zealand, there is several million large Balkan diaspora there and Belgrade can be used as transfer hub for Australians wanting to travel to Europe on business or leisure. Becoming a hub like Doha. If Air Serbia just bought an A350-1000 or A350-900 ULR
Australia from Europe is completely unprofitable. Only European airline flying to Australia is BA and they are only left with a single destination (Sydney).
DeleteAustralia and definitely New Zealand will never happen. Long flight times that require multiple aircraft with little yield.
Delete@10,05
Marek never said YYZ was unlikely. It's actually in the plans if you properly read his comments on the route. They got a better deal in ORD which is why it'll be launched before YYZ. PVG will most likely be the next long haul route starting either June or July. PVG I believe is the largest underserved route from BEG. My guess is that YYZ will happen with the 4th A330.
If launching Australian routes was that simple TK would of been all over Australia yesterday. They are closer to Australia, have a significantly larger network not only in Europe but the Middle East and North Africa, have significantly higher O&D demand. In every way that you look, TK has significant advantage over JU and still hasn't launched a single Australian route. The best JU could do, and this is a far stretch, is to launch flights to somewhere in South East Asia (SIN, BKK or KUL). BKK has the highest demand of the 3 but low yields is the problem. It's better to use that capacity to other routes which can make a profit.
What about LAX, HK or Shenzhen?
DeleteReturn for Brisbane with normal'ish transfer times thru Vienna and China is around 1500~¢. I don't think you could actually match that price flying out of Belgrade to Sydney.
Delete@JATBEGMEL you should read about Qantas and their Sunrise project they are planning to start long haul from syndey to paris and london. the flight from London to Perth is extremely profitable their passanger loads are 80%+ on every flight. Also look at Qatar and emirates making a huge profit by being a hub for aaustralia and new zealand to reach europe.
DeleteAir serbia could do the same as with China, the flights to China are just to serve chinese citizens.
Turkish airline looked into flights into australia but because Turkish is so big and their airports are so big its a lot harder to fit flights to australia into their operation. Serbia and belgrade have a lot of holes and empty time.
Bravo Air Serbia 🇷🇸🇷🇸🇷🇸
ReplyDeleteNew destinations are a good sign of growth potential.
ReplyDeleteSome good news is that YU-APB seems to be coming back to fleet after 5 months. It operate flight to Berlin last night and is flying to Istanbul, Milan and Thessaloniki today.
ReplyDeleteFinally!
DeleteVery happy to hear LIS is doing well. I think it will turn out like another Barcelona for JU. Let's see.
ReplyDeletehope so but winter might be an issue.
DeleteWhere's the map? JU vs. JAT?
ReplyDeleteYou are free to make it yourself; why are people so entitled lol
DeleteDon't be stupid.
DeleteIt's more a question of consistence.
Ex-yu used to present one for far less important milestones than this one STFU.
Who hurt you OP?
DeleteIndeed, there should be a map for this.
DeleteBravo Srbija!
ReplyDeleteExcellent news
ReplyDeleteI hope they look into the UK a bit more. JAT used to serve 5 destinations in the UK.
ReplyDeleteYes, but it was a time when YU citizens could enter UK without visa.
DeleteMost of those UK destinations were seasonal from the Croatian coast.
DeleteTrue that
DeleteI think there is room for 1-2 additional UK routes. MAN and perhaps LGW considering the slot issues at LHR and JU wanting additional flights to London.
DeleteAnonymous10:09
DeleteUK and Ireland will work perfectly if Serbian citizens get allowed to visit these counties visa free. Abolishing visa for Serbian passport holders is not even on the horizon so I don't think AS would introduce much new routes to the Isles any time soon. I would like to see Dublin and Manchester at least once a week, but who would travel?
@12,12
DeleteWho would travel?
- Balkan diaspora living in the UK.
- Brits heading to the Balkans.
Demand isn't huge but enough for JU to have requested an additional 5 pw into LHR a couple years back. A few extra flights a week would definitely work even without visa liberation.
JATBEGMEL12:36
DeleteI was talking about extra destinations in the UK and Ireland.
@13,10
DeleteI was talking about extra flights and destinations in the UK as well. I mentioned MAN and LGW in the reply above.
Beautiful photo :)
ReplyDeleteHow does this compare to say TAROM, Aegean, Bulgaria Air?
ReplyDeleteBulgaria Air really should not be put in the same league as these ailines.
DeleteTAROM has has less than 50 destinations. Aegean had over 140.
Delete*has
DeleteAnd Bulgaria Air has under 30
DeleteWhich are the main destinations Aegean serves that Air Serbia doesn't and vice-versa?
DeleteWell for started Aegean has a lot of destinations from HER and RHO. When comparing them to JU we should look at what they offer from ATH and SKG.
DeleteBtw for me it's much more interesting what kind of frequencies they offer to key destinations. This summer JU will almost match A3 in Rome and Barcelona. Only difference is that Aegean has more capacity as they deploy their A321neo to both cities.
Aegean has two big hubs ATH and SKG while they also offer flights from KLX,HER and RHO. They have a good network to the Middle East from ATH while they also have seasonal flights from HER to Beirut for instance. Middle East is a region where JU should focus more.
DeleteWhen will Trieste be back on sale? They said a couple of weeks ago that it is coming back this summer.
ReplyDeleteSoon
DeleteIt's good that they added more frequencies. Yesterday I was looking at some fares to Rome in May and they are charging around 27.000 RSD.
ReplyDeleteFlights seem to be filling up so that's very good for them.
Hopefully down the road Rome goes to 14 or 17 weekly flights.
And work it will.
ReplyDeleteZa velicinu Srbije i okolnosti, trenutni razvoj Er Srbije ce potvrditi buducnost sa imlementacijm operativne strategije.
ReplyDeleteSa upornoscu tima koji ostvaruje projektovano. Iskreno je verovati da ce za Prvu stogodisnjicu Er Srbije mreza saobracaja se prosiriti na preko sto aerodroma na godisnjem nivou. Racunajuci redovan i carter saobracaj.
Od 2028 godine moguce je uspostaviti saobracaj sa nekoliko manjih turboprop aviona nove generacije. Koji bi opsluzivali pet do sest Aerodroma koji su clanovi kompanije Aerodromi Srbije. Sa ovom flotom bi se sirio intra saobracaj na sekundarnim i tercijalnim aerodromima
sa Republikom Srpskom B i H. Kao i u Crnoj Gori, Albaniji, Grckoj, Madjarskoj, Severnoj Makedoniji, Hrvatskoj, Bugarskoj... Promene u razvoju i otvaranje Balkana je podrazumevajuci faktor. Kako realnosti interkonekcije i turizma, tako i realnog rasta Er Srbije i njenog Haba na Aerodromu Nikola Tesla i sire. Dobra strategija ostvaruje i rast i transformaciju. Novo vreme je u toku.
Do sledeceg leta trudimo se. Avioni su spremni.
Srecna Nova Letnja Sezona Rt Srbijo.
We are together. LET FLYING. 🛫🌐🛫🌐✈😀✈♥️🛫
Rodney Marinkovic and Aviation Enthusiast Associate Group. ♥️✈
Jasmineeeeeee!!! Dje si? Kaka je bila kahva danas? Slusa l'se kaka muz'ka? S'a pisu nov'ne?
ReplyDeleteRano je za sve to, mora se spavati 🤣
DeleteAs I have said earlier as anonymous 🌏 is very unlikely for a long, long time. But Toronto I still feel is a possibility. Even if they fly to Toronto once a week in the winter.
ReplyDeleteBy the way, pozdrav always nice to read your columns.
I would really like to see the livery updated. The bilboard titles are lost among the windows and the engines are somehow strange. I don't think they need new livery, just to freshen up a bit.
ReplyDeleteI know this is not most important, but maybe it is a good time now to change the boarding music and update a bit Čačak chips and Toto/Noblice catering options. Otherwise go Air Serbia.
ReplyDeleteYes would be nice to freshen things up.
Delete