Quote:
Originally Posted by magee_b
But pricing is not up to the airport. It’s up to the airlines.
Pre-Covid the YSJ team had done some market-research to figure out their “leakage” of passengers to other airports. They used this info to negotiate some sort of equalization of Air Canada fares between YSJ/YFC/YQM, which helped somewhat, but cheaper fares will always be found once you have more than one legitimate airline option to take you to your destination.
First steps for the new CEO should be to update their understanding of their market, understand their current leakage, and if it seems greater demand actually exists, create a business case for increased services - then take that to Air Canada for service increases or Porter/WestJet for new service/service resumptions. It may sound modest, but some small wins there with an added frequency or two, or a new daily scheduled national airline partner would go a long way in getting things turned around.
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Agree that competition is the key. Getting Porter back here with a Toronto or Montreal flight (preferably both)....or even Ottawa would be huge.
If people had another option to fly out of YSJ and to connect onwards to a selection of destinations it would put significant pressure on AC to step up their game. If nothing else it would add to convenience and reduce leakage to YFC and YQM.
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