Ancillary sales helps keep AirAsia bullish
Keeping fares down and selling more ancillary products has helped low-cost airline AirAsia produce “commendable” second quarter results in a challenging climate.
The airline, which will switch its Malaysia-London flights from Stansted to Gatwick in late October, grew its profit before tax by 0.6% to £30 million.
“The second quarter is traditionally one of our weaker quarters. But despite the challenging environment in the industry, the team has come through again,” said group CEO Tan Sri Dr Tony Fernandes.
“We’ve always maintained that instead of raising fares for higher yields – running the risk of dampening air travel – we’d rather keep fares at reasonable levels so as to attract higher passenger loads and boost revenue through ancillary services.”
He said the airline had enjoyed passenger load factors of 81%, up 4 percentage points over the same period last year.
Looking forward to the rest of 2011, Fernandes was bullish.
“Forward bookings are looking very strong. We shall continue to work our best to deliver high load factors of at least 80% and to maintain the lowest operating costs in the industry.
“Additionally, the fall in crude oil prices and strengthening of respective local currencies have somewhat eased the impact of high jet fuel prices on operating costs.”
AirAsia Group has a network of around 160 routes covering destinations in the ASEAN region, China, Hong Kong, Macau, Taiwan, India, Sri Lanka and Australia.
by Bev Fearis
Bev
Editor in chief Bev Fearis has been a travel journalist for 25 years. She started her career at Travel Weekly, where she became deputy news editor, before joining Business Traveller as deputy editor and launching the magazine’s website. She has also written travel features, news and expert comment for the Guardian, Observer, Times, Telegraph, Boundless and other consumer titles and was named one of the top 50 UK travel journalists by the Press Gazette.
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