Interessante analisi anna.aero sulle operazioni tedesche di U2, con menzione anche sulle operazioni Italia-Italia di U2 che avrebbero avuto una perdita di €8M EUR nel periodo APR19-MAR20
Germany is easyJet’s worst-performing country
Germany is easyJet’s fifth-largest country market by seat capacity, yet it is by far its worst-performing by profitability.
Germany lost an estimated £84 million in this year period, very significantly more than other loss-making countries, such as Denmark and Sweden.
Some, like Albania, are new to the carrier’s network.
Source: RDC Aviation. Note: both directions combined; EBIT profit in GBP; full airport charges.
Germany’s losses come from very fast growth
easyJet’s Germany losses will primarily be from its very fast growth there.
On a calendar-year basis, the carrier added almost 11 million seats to, from, and within Germany since 2010, for a CAGR of 11%. This is much higher than for easyJet’s other top countries, which varied between 3% (Spain) and 7% (France).
At country-level, easyJet had 158 routes to, from, and within Germany in 2018, up from 99 the year before.
Source: OAG Schedules Analyser.
Tegel was the primary reason for easyJet’s big Germany growth
The airline’s Germany seats grew very quickly following the end of airberlin in 2017. Berlin Tegel was the primary beneficiary. Tegel only joined easyJet’s network in 2018 – and it had 59 routes from it that first year.
Clearly, it considered Tegel – and Berlin – of strategic importance with the ability to attain great dominance. Tegel is now easyJet’s second-largest airport, and the carrier is by far Tegel’s number-one airline.
This changes with the opening of Berlin Brandenburg, which is now due to open this November.
Various country-pairs involving Germany are in the loss-making list
RDC Aviation’s Apex indicates easyJet’s highest estimated loss-making country-pairs, reproduced here:
- Germany – Germany: – £73.05 million
- Germany – Austria: -£8.44 million
- Italy – Italy: -£7.10 million
- Germany – Denmark: -£5.75 million
- Germany – Italy: -£5.25 million
- Germany – Sweden: -£4.38 million
- France – Israel: -£4.01 million
Germany features heavily throughout, with many country-pairs, such as Germany – Denmark, being relatively small yet loss-making.
Despite only operating two routes between Germany and Demark – Berlin Tegel to both Aarhus and Copenhagen – its estimated loss, in the year to March 2020, was nearly £6 million.
easyJet’s seats between the two countries trebled between early 2018 versus 2017, but that was two years ago. Competition doesn’t help with yields, with Berlin – Copenhagen, at city-pair level, having two competing carriers, Norwegian and SAS.
Domestic Germany accounted for 87% of easyJet’s Germany loss
It was Germany’s domestic routes that accounted for most of the carrier’s country loss.
Domestic services formed a key part of its development at Tegel, with the carrier previously saying that 41% of its intra-Germany passengers travelled for business reasons, presumably from smaller companies. However, most of the country’s domestic passengers are for business reasons anyway.
Anecdotally, Eurowings achieves higher-yielding business traffic that easyJet is not achieving, the result of even higher frequency, stronger name awareness, and Lufthansa lobbying.
Pre-coronavirus, easyJet had a network of five year-round domestic routes from Berlin Tegel: Cologne, Dusseldorf, Frankfurt, Munich, and Stuttgart. Sylt is served in summer.
However, it appears that it has ended Berlin – Frankfurt: unlike the others, it is no longer bookable, and it does not appear in OAG Schedules Analyser.
Of strategic importance or do cuts now come first?
easyJet may decide that Germany in general – and Berlin in particular – is still of significant strategic importance going forward. However, it will be interesting to see what implications the opening of Brandenburg has on this.
With the pressure of coronavirus, everything must be on the table, but will longer-term importance override shorter-term needs?
If routes, airports, and basses are loss-making or marginal or otherwise underperforming, they should be very seriously considered for cutting.