Like AC with Tango over 15 years ago.

Flairs load yields have been very steady, they’ve been doing pretty good on their core routes (YYZ/YWG/YYC/YEG/YVR). Apparently they are making a small profit and the main two airlines aren’t fully undercutting Flair since they don’t seem to be taking a heavy piece of their pie.

I highly doubt AC will compete with Flair on their new Atlantic routes, WS on the other hand might.

The route expansion in Atlantic Canada by Flair (to me at least) is a response to Swoops Atlantic expansion.

So at last YOW lands an ULCC. Flying YOW-YYZ on Flair with no luggage could be about as cheap as the bus, train or driving. YOW's domestic traffic, between this and AC's seat capacity growth should grow at least 6% over the summer months in 2020.

With YYG landing both Swoop and Flair and WS to YYC, they will have one heck of a year.

Well WS/Swoop have been undercutting Flair with their $1 fares. Will be interesting to see what the Competition Tribunal rules.

In some ways Flair are smart to abandon YXX and YHM for YYZ and YVR as they know WS won't send Swoop into those airports to cannibalize their own yields.

I missed this announcement (or announcements). What are the details of Swoop entering the Atlantic market?

Beings in late June, flights from Moncton, Charlottetown and St. John’s (NL) all to Hamilton I believe.

https://www.flyswoop.com/news/swoop-...coast-network/

Thanks!

Some AC schedule changes at YOW and YYC in June:

-YOW-YYC frequency/capacity increase from 3x 319 to 4x E90
-YOW-LHR is a 788 for May (no flight on 31MAY20) and then upgauges to a 330 (daily) as of 01JUN20.

Anything beyond 30JUN20 for AC at this point appears to just be a placeholder until the fate of the MAX is known (i.e. 3x YYC and the 788 on YOW-LHR return on 01JUL20). I'd imagine June will = all summer if the MAX doesn't return until after summer peak (highly likely).

First off, I'm really stoked that Ottawa is finally getting some ULCC flights. That was a big gap. It'll be interesting to see if / when Montreal gets some. I would've thought that Montreal is a pretty top tourism draw in Canada, but I've said that before. But in general I'm really excited to see some more pressure hopefully being applied to lower flight costs in Canada.

It's interesting that NB and PEI are getting ULCC flights before Saskatchewan. Why do people think that is? Is it a tourism difference? Flair did try some flights from Saskatoon but later dropped them, IIRC.

^ It's funny that the same cities seem to be consistently left out of ULCC route networks in Canada. It's like you can't start a ULCC without including Abbotsford, Edmonton, Winnipeg, Hamilton and Halifax. But Quebec or St. John's? Never.

I feel like both airlines are focused more on fighting over marketshare at airports that both airlines fly into already, like Edmonton and Abbotsford, rather than looking for new markets to take over. If Flair is struggling in places like Abbotsford and Hamilton why don't they see if they can establish a customer base in Sask and Winnipeg to make up for the losses? Am I missing something or...?

The ULCC companies don't even have websites in French. Quebec is clearly off their radar, at least for the near future.

If an ULCC ever was to come to the Montreal area, I imagine it would want to set up shop at St. Hubert Airport. This airport is actually closer to downtown that Trudeau Airport, and also has a somewhat large basin of people nearby to whom it would be more convenient to fly out of than YUL (2.1 million in Monteregie, Centre-du-Quebec and Estrie).

My sister made this mistake planning a vacation with my mom
She handles peoples money for a living and she has lived in Canada all her life.
Gets to the wrong St(saint) John Hotel, starts planning tourist stuff to do and then realizes after consulting with many locals shes in the wrong town.

My mom asked me to keep this a family secret till this thread!!!!

^ To be honest, before this forum it never registered to me that there are more than one St John(s) in Canada, It wasn't on my radar that the Maritimes didn't include Newfoundland either. The only St John I've ever been to is in the US Virgin Islands.

It does make sense tourism wise because most Saskatchewan flyers are traveling either to the US or further a field in which case flying for a nominal surcharge with Westjet, AC or Delta to get to a hub like Calgary or Minneapolis etc is still a lot cheaper than to fly ULCC to a hub, American tourists hunters & fishers etc are most likely to travel to Saskatchewan the same way, just in reverse.
It's not very common for most Saskatchewan residents to fly O&D to Calgary or Edmonton & then Uber or rent a car instead of just driving the few hours it takes to get to the Alberta cities to begin with.

Non-stop flights from Saskatchewan to bigger tourist destinations like Vegas, Phoenix, Orlando etc are always going to be a bigger market than to fly to Montreal for example.

For the record:

NL: St. John's
NB: Saint John

(It's normal to find this a bit confusing)

The interesting thing here is that (from a Halifax perspective) Montreal is seen as just as valid a tourist/vacation destination as Vegas or Orlando, and Phoenix is not really seen as much of a tourist destination at all.

Will be interesting to see if the Via Rail cancelations between Toronto and Montreal will boost domestic pax numbers at YYZ/YTZ/YUL. Seeing quite a few more heavies than usual between YYZ and YUL. With all the China cancelations, AC has some spare widebodies they can use. Pretty convenient with the train situation in Eastern Canada.

A lot of older people and middle aged people as well have second homes in phoenix and a good portion of the elderly population live there during the winter. That's why it's such a popular destination. Its like the wests version of Florida.

Have you ever been on a flight to PHX? The flights are full most of the time, from western Canadian cities, in the winter, with golfers and snowbirds and such!

He was referring to those on the East Coast not seeing Arizona and Vegas are typical southern destinations. On the East coast the snowbirds go to Florida and Georgia far more often.

My impression was that in MB Alberta and SK snowbirds head to Arizona and New Mexico (with the odd Vegas sprinkled in thanks to plenty of direct flights) and BC folks went to California.