A recent study shows that the Austrian aviation market is growing – especially with regard to the full service carriers. Low cost carriers on the other hand recorded slight decrease in the number of booked flights.
The aviation market in Austria is booming. The number of booked flights from Austria increased as well as the number of passengers who booked their flight and departed from Austria. These are the findings of a recent study by Amadeus Austria, provider of IT solutions for travel industry. The growth was recorded mainly for the Full Service Carriers, while the Low Cost Carrier market stagnated thanks to the bankruptcy of SkyEurope.
According to the authors of the study, the volume of the Austrian airline market increased by 11.8%. Over a half of the flights (50.6%) were booked via travel agents, whose share nevertheless decreased. In 2009 the percentage of flights booked via travel agents was 52%. The best results were recorded for the direct sales of full service airlines. Their share rose from 29.1 to 32.5%. The share of the low cost airlines slightly decreased after the bankruptcy of Sky Europe to 16.9% (in 2009 it was 18.9%), reported Touristaustria.at.
Regarding the prices, the situation is quite different though. An average price of a flight booked through a travel agency was 221 EUR in 2010 which is 9 EUR more than in 2009 (212.25 EUR). The price of flight booked directly by the provider was 156 EUR for full service airlines, compared to 2009 when the price was 150 EUR. In both segments there is an increase of prices by 4%. The price of low cost airlines rose by 6.25% from 80 EUR to 85 EUR.
The sales of the whole Austrian market were estimated at approximately 1.7 billion EUR. This amount is 19.38% higher than in 2009 when the sales were 1.424 billion EUR. The biggest share went to the travel agents (63.2%) and it was slightly over 1 billion EUR revenue. In 2009 their revenue was 940 million EUR.
The travel agents lost the most due to direct sales of full service carriers. Instead of 358 million EUR in 2009, in 2010 482 million went directly to the pockets of Austrian Airlines, Lufthansa & Co. Their share rose from 25% to 218%.