SPAIN: Vueling Airlines Launches Flights From Palma de Mallorca To Stuttgart, Vienna And Lisbon

Vueling launched three new routes from Palma de Mallorca (PMI) in the last week, with services commencing to Stuttgart (STR) and Vienna (VIE) on 1 June, and to Lisbon (LIS) on 2 June.

The latter 1,025-kilometre connection to the Portuguese capital city will be operated twice-weekly on Wednesdays and Saturdays and there is no direct competition.

The 1,138-kilometre link to Stuttgart and the 1,456-kilometre route to Vienna will both be operated four times weekly and there is incumbent competition on each airport pair.

The Stuttgart route is already operated by Laudamotion, Eurowings, TUIfly, Condor, easyJet and Ryanair, with these six carriers providing a combined 89 weekly flights.

The Vienna sector is currently flown by Laudamotion and Eurowings which offer a combined 39 rotations.

Commenting on the new link to Palma de Mallorca Julian Jäger, Joint CEO and COO of Vienna Airport said: Thanks to the new flight connection, passengers will enjoy an even broader travel offering to Spain’s most popular holiday island.

The island offers a change of scene to travellers of all ages, whether for a city trip, beach holiday or sport vacation.

Vueling has added two more sectors to its domestic network in the last seven days, with two new sectors from Palma de Mallorca (PMI), its fourth biggest operation after Barcelona, Rome Fiumicino and Paris Orly.

On 15 June, the IAG-owned subsidiary started a three times weekly rotation to Jerez (XRY).

The next day it began a similar frequency on the 393-kilometre city pair to Zaragoza (ZAZ).

Both sectors will be flown by the airline’s A320 fleet, with the latter route to Zaragoza facing direct competition from Air Europa (three times weekly) and Volotea (twice-weekly).

This summer Vueling will serve 26 destinations non-stop from Palma de Mallorca. This is one more than last summer.

However, while five new destinations have been added the others being Florence, Lille and Zurich, four have been dropped: Algiers, Brussels, Catania and Turin.

Vueling Airlines, S.A. is a Spanish low-cost airline based at El Prat de Llobregat in Greater Barcelona with hubs in Barcelona–El Prat Airport and Leonardo da Vinci–Fiumicino Airport in Rome, Italy.

Its name comes from the Spanish word vuelo, which means flight. It is the largest airline in Spain by fleet size and the number of destinations.

There are thirteen additional bases at A Coruna, Alicante, Amsterdam, Bilbao, Florence, Madrid, Málaga, Palma de Mallorca, Paris-Orly, Santiago de Compostela, Seville and Valencia.

A fifteenth summer seasonal base is located at Ibiza.

Vueling serves over 100 destinations in Africa, Asia, Europe and the Middle East. In 2015, the airline carried more than 24 million passengers, with a load factor of 81%.

MTV has since ended.

In November 2010, Vueling announced a new base at Toulouse Airport in France from April 2011, followed in December 2010 by the announcement of a new base in Amsterdam, also to open during April 2011.

The Toulouse base opened on 23 April 2011, but has since closed.

In January 2011, further expansion was announced with Vueling adding a further nine aircraft to its fleet, including Airbus A319 aircraft.

Six Airbus A320s were delivered between April and June 2011, whilst the remaining two A320s were delivered by the end of 2011.

On 21 March 2012, it was announced by CEO Alex Cruz that Rome would be added as a new base.

The base launched on 25 March 2012 with one aircraft based there, the airline has since expanded at Rome with numerous new destinations.

On 5 December 2012, Vueling announced the opening of a new base of operations in Florence, the carrier is to base one aircraft there and serve four new European destinations.

Ten months later, on 25 October 2013, Vueling launched Florence-Catania, its first domestic route in Italy.

Since November 2013, the airline has continued to expand from its hub at Barcelona.

On 6 November 2013, Vueling announced a new base with one aircraft in Brussels, with seven new destinations from May 2014, in addition to the four previous routes from Brussels.

Also in November 2013, Vueling announced an expansion of its base at Rome-Fiumicino. From mid-2014, 8 aircraft would be based there, operating more than 30 routes.

This expansion meant Rome-Fiumcino would become Vueling's second hub, after Barcelona.

During the first weekend of July 2016, Vueling had many delays and cancellations, which resulted in an investigation by the Spanish authorities.

During the same month, Vueling cancelled all the flights to Sheremetyevo International Airport, Vilnius Airport and Rabat–Sale Airport. Clients are able to get a refund or fly to the nearest airport where Vueling flies.

In October 2016, Vueling shut down their bases in Brussels, Catania and Palermo as part of restructuring measures.

In March 2017, Vueling cancelled its route from Barcelona to Frankfurt Airport.

On 29 December 2017, it was announced that IAG would acquire Austrian airline Niki as a subsidiary for Vueling.

In November 2012, International Airlines Group, whose subsidiary Iberia held a 45.85% stake in Vueling, offered to buy the remaining 54.15% of the company with both Iberia and IAG owning both shares and not resulting in the company being wholly owned by IAG through 100% of shares.

IAG, also the owner of British Airways, plans to use Vueling to help stem losses at Iberia.

However, market trends increased profits and improved figures from Vueling resulting in a higher share-price had made IAG's offer a significant undervaluation of the airline.

Vueling had urged its shareholders to reject IAG's offer and its shareholders had until the 8th of April 2013 to decide upon the recommendation.

On 27 March 2013, IAG improved its offer for Vueling, raising its offer per share from €7 to €9.25.

Vueling shares quickly surged following the announcement, rising by 8.8% to €9.23 following a temporary suspension as BMAD waited on an official comment from Vueling regarding the updated offer.

The acceptance period was also increased by 48 calendar days.

On 9 April 2013, the board of Vueling unanimously recommended shareholders accept an improved offer of €9.25 per share from IAG.

IAG CEO Willie Walsh confirmed that the board had recommended the new offer; however, Walsh also stated that Vueling would not be merged with Iberia, saying, Vueling will operate as a stand-alone entity in IAG group.

On 23 April 2013, IAG acquired control of Vueling which saw the recently purchased 44.66% stake by IAG merged with Iberia's existing 45.85% stake to form a 90.51% shareholding.

Vueling remains a standalone company now within the IAG and its management structure is unchanged; however, Vueling's CEO Alex Cruz reports directly to IAG CEO Willie Walsh.

Vueling has codeshare agreements with the following airlines:

- British Airways

- Cathay Pacific

- Iberia

- Qatar Airways


The Vueling fleet consists of the following aircraft:

Airbus A319-100 - 5

Airbus A320-200 - 89

Airbus A321-200 - 15

Total - 107

Vueling orders for more aircrafts:

Airbus A320neo - 47


Tourism Observer

ITALY: Overtourism Impacting More And More Destinations Worldwide

Experts who gathered in Italy for the 25th World Travel Monitor Forum® in Pisa last month agreed that the travel and tourism industry must draw up new strategies to manage the phenomenon of overtourism impacting more and more destinations worldwide.

In view of protests by residents at popular destinations across the globe, the Pisa forum – initiated by consultancy IPK International and supported by ITB Berlin – found that diverse measures and solutions must be taken by local authorities to manage visitor numbers without restricting growth.

The international travel industry must act together with destinations on coordinated strategies including managing seasonality and visitor flows, spreading tourism benefits such as jobs and revenues more widely among local communities, and investing in infrastructure and protection of tourism assets, the experts suggested.

According to the findings, overtourism affects travelers as much as it does residents, the destinations, tourist attractions and local infrastructure.

Indicatively, approximately 25 percent of all international tourists felt that their destination had been over-crowded this year, according to a World Travel Monitor® survey of 29,000 travelers in 24 countries in Europe, Asia and the Americas conducted in September 2017.

With 9 percent – equivalent to around 100 million tourists – admitting this over-crowding had affected the quality of their outbound trip.

Ski resorts were the most crowded tourism locations with one in five (19 percent) saying their winter sports holiday had been impacted affected by overtourism.

As for the most affected cities these were: Guangzhou (24 percent), Shanghai (23 percent), Beijing (21 percent), Amsterdam and Istanbul (both 19 percent), and Barcelona, Florence and Venice (18 percent), according to the survey

Overtourism is clearly not good for nature, culture, locals and tourists alike. However, global tourism has not reached its limits.

Many destinations would be happy to see more visitors, either throughout the year or in the low season.

So tourism does not have a growth problem but rather a regional and seasonal problem, said Rolf Freitag, CEO of IPK International.

The 25th World Travel Monitor Forum was supported by ITB Berlin.




Tourism Observer

SPAIN: Iberia Express Grows By 8.4% From Madrid Since Last Year;

Iberia Express launched its latest route to the UK from Madrid on the 8 September in the form of a thrice-weekly service to Manchester, a sector that will then operate twice-weekly from the end of October for the remainder of W15/16. The carrier, a subsidiary of Spain’s national carrier, Iberia, also serves Edinburgh and London Gatwick from the Spanish capital, with the airline also serving London Heathrow from other Spanish airports.

Iberia Express was set up on 6 October 2011 by IAG, and commenced its first flight operations on 25 March 2012. The main intention of the airline was to operate European routes that were unprofitable when flown by mainline Iberia, and to make them viable by the new carrier operating the sectors with lower running costs. In its short history, Iberia Express has become the fourth biggest airline to fly from Madrid, with over 6 million passengers having flown and 50,000 flights operated within the carrier’s first two years of operation. In 2013, a report by FlightStats confirmed that Iberia Express tops all other European airlines in terms of punctuality. The airline operates an all-A320 fleet, of which a majority have been passed to the company from mainline Iberia.

Iberia Express is Madrid’s #4 largest carrier
Iberia Express remains the fourth largest airline from Madrid (highlighted in Iberia Express colours in the table above) in S15, the same position it held last year. What is interesting to note however is that mainline Iberia (highlighted in Iberia colours), the number one carrier from the Spanish capital, has seen a greater growth in seat capacity in the past 12 months of 9.5% when compared with that of Iberia Express’ 8.3%. Overall, Iberia Express occupies 7.8% of seat capacity from Madrid, down only 0.1% from the 7.9% which it occupied last year, a result of Madrid seeing two additional carriers operating services from the facility according to OAG.

Tenerife North overtakes Santiago de Compostela
After reporting a growth in seat capacity over the past 12 months of 9.8%, the 1,770-kilometre sector to Tenerife North overtakes Santiago de Compostela to become the carrier’s number one route from its Madrid hub, although the latter is also reporting growth of 3.3% in seat capacity. Since last year, three new airports have entered the top 12 when compared to the same time period of 2014 (highlighted in light green), with Frankfurt (no longer served by Iberia Express), Malaga and Tenerife South no longer being in the top 12. London Gatwick goes straight into the top 12 at ninth spot, tied with Berlin Tegel, after the airline launched services to the airport from the Spanish capital on 28 March according to OAG, operating with an 11 times weekly frequency. Also joining the top 12 party from Madrid are Lanzarote and Fuerteventura, two routes which have both been operated by Iberia Express since the airline commenced service.

Destinations double since operations commenced
Iberia Express in 2012 served a total of 16 destinations from Madrid, this number has now risen to 31 destinations in 2015. From the destination split, the majority of routes served are Spanish domestic services. Of the international country markets served by Iberia Express from Madrid, the average amount of airports served is two. This shows the importance of the Spanish domestic market within Iberia Express’ operation, a market that faces strong competition from ULCC Ryanair. Soon Iberia Express will face strong competition from Norwegian, which is planning to start domestic services to Gran Canaria and Tenerife North during the start of W15/16 season from the Spanish capital. The latest route launched by Iberia Express from Madrid was to Manchester on 8 September.

Services operated alongside mainline Iberia
An analysis of OAG Schedules Analyser data for September 2015 reveals that only three routes of Iberia Express’ operation from Madrid are operated alongside mainline Iberia operations. The destinations are Athens, Düsseldorf and Gran Canaria.

Iberia Express currently has no new routes planned for S16 from its Madrid hub, and it is also worth noting that neither does mainline Iberia, making it interesting to think as to what cities will be the next destinations for the subsidiary. When looking at Iberia Express’ route map (as shown below), we can see that there is a very even geographical spread in relation to the location of western European airports served by the carrier, with key capital cities such as Amsterdam, Berlin, Dublin, London and Paris being served from Madrid. Of the international routes served from Madrid, eight are capital cities. In relation to the potential future routes for Iberia Express, the main focus will possibly be the transfer of services from mainline Iberia to Express which could potential include Brussels, Budapest (launched 2 June), Florence, Hamburg, Milan (Linate or Malpensa), and Rome Fiumicino.

In relation to new routes for the Iberia group that have the potential to be served under the Express brand, one could be Oslo Gardermoen, a European capital currently not served by mainline and is currently only served by Norwegian. With Iberia Express having oneworld alliance advantages opening up connections to Latin and South America, it would give them the edge over Norwegian on the sector. Another potential destination would be Helsinki, which is currently served by fellow oneworld member Finnair. It is worth noting though that LCC Norwegian also operates to the Finnish capital.

Within the domestic network, the key route most likely to be transferred from mainline is Barcelona. With this lucrative domestic route seeing strong declines in traffic since the development of high speed rail, the national carrier may want to reduce costs on the city pair by using the Express model to help increase profit margins, operating alongside Vueling. Other potential domestic routes that could be switched from mainline to Express include A Coruña, Asturias and Santander.

As of September 2015, Iberia Express’s destinations consist of 14 domestic and 18 international airports. All flights depart, arrive and connect in Madrid, except for the following routes: Vigo-Tenerife North, Asturias-Tenerife North, Tenerife North-London Heathrow, Tenerife North-Lyon and Gran Canaria-London Heathrow.