More leisure passengers boost Eurostar numbers
Saturday, 12 Apr, 2010
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Improved sales revenue of £178 million was clocked up by Eurostar in the first three months of the year.
The figure was up more than five per cent from £168 million in the same period in 2009.
Passenger numbers totalled two million, up from 1.9 million in the first quarter of last year.
Within this figure, the number of travellers from overseas markets outside Europe increased by 22%.
The number of leisure passengers travelling between the UK and the continent went up by six per cent to 1.76 million.
The ‘bottoming out’ of the business market that began in the latter part of the last year, continued in the first quarter, with sales broadly the same as the same quarter last year, according to the company.
New CEO Nicolas Petrovic said: “Whilst there is still uncertainty about the economic outlook, we have seen a big increase in leisure travel over the last three months, not just from the continent but from overseas markets.
“We are also seeing growing evidence of travellers wanting to switch from plane to high-speed train for longer, connecting journeys.
“Ensuring that our customers can enjoy seamless connections to other destinations on the continent is a key priority and we are committed to making that experience easy and efficient.”
A move to restructure Eurostar from being a partnership between three railway companies to a single unified corporate entity is described as being “well advanced”.
Eurostar shareholders (London & Continental Railways, SNCF and SNCB) have signed a ‘Framework Agreement’ enabling the final stages of the restructuring of the business to take place.
Eurostar is trialling a service with SNCF to allow passengers to travel between the UK and Provence, connecting via Lille, in specially reserved coaches on connecting TGVs.
Tickets for travel to Lyon and Marseille on connecting services are on sale for travel from June 1 with prices starting at £109 return to Lyon and £119 return to Marseille.
The option is likely to be extended to other destinations.
A new leisure loyalty programme, Eurostar Plus, has been introduced to provide cash-back to passengers. The scheme offers the further option of earning points by booking travel for friends and family.
Travellers collect one point for every £1/1€ spent on travel booked via eurostar.com and receive a £20/20€ e-voucher for every 300 points collected for use to book future Eurostar travel.
by Phil Davies
Phil Davies
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