The Prague Post http://www.aaaradiotaxi.cz/index.php?xSET=lang&xLANG=2
December 5th, 2008
Prague accommodation

Second-city skies open to Europe

Budget airline Ryanair launches daily flights on direct London-Brno route

Passengers deplane Ryanair's first flight from Stansted Airport outside London to Brno, south Moravia, March 24.
By Jeremie Feinblatt
 For The Prague Post
March 31, 2005


Six months ago the idea that Ryanair would fly to Brno, let alone Eastern Europe, was far-fetched. The outspoken chief of Europe's largest and most aggressive low-cost airline, Michael O'Leary, had surprised industry observers when he declared -- in opposition to a number of other low-cost airlines -- that the company's growth would come from Western Europe, and that Eastern Europe remained a "low priority."

"There's a lot of talk that Eastern Europe is the Holy Grail; but talk is all it is," he said at the World Low-Cost Airline Congress last September.

Things change. On March 24, the Irish airline introduced two new eastbound flights between London Stansted and the Central European cities of Wroc½aw, in Poland, and Brno. It estimates that some 40,000 people will fly its service to Brno this year.

The low-cost carrier has picked its destinations cautiously. Think of Beauvais near Paris, Charleroi near Brussels or Hahn near Frankfurt -- all three deserted airports until Ryanair came in a few years ago. Now they are among of the fastest growing in Europe. Hahn and Charleroi each receive over 2 million passengers a year.

Ryanair received an offer from the south Moravia region, which owns Brno Airport, in July 2004, after ownership of the regional airport was transferred from the state to the region.

"We were offered low landing and handling charges and decided to try out the market," said Caroline Baldwin, the airline's sales and marketing manager for Germany, Austria and Central Europe. She added that these charges are comparable to what the airline pays in France or Germany -- very low.

DAILY FLIGHT: BRNO-STANSTED

Flights

• Brno M-F: 18:00-London 19:15

Wknds: 17:50-London 19:05 • London M-F: 14:30-Brno 17:35

Wknds: 14:20-Brno 17:25

Prices

• Tickets from about 120 Kc ($5.20) + tax

• Average return fare 1,200 Kc + tax

Reservations www.ryanair.com
The Ryanair flights will create 100 new jobs and provide an influx of British tourists and businessmen. "We expect a significant amount of business traffic, because there's no other way to get there [directly]," Baldwin said.

Tourism boom

The new service could also potentially triple the number of British travelers in south Moravia and significantly increase tourism revenues. Of the 7.9 million tourists who visited the Czech Republic last year, south Moravia received only 330,000 of them, or 4.2 percent. Most came from Germany, while a mere 10,000 came from the UK.

The mayor's office in Brno registered only 180,000 foreign tourists to the city last year, With a population of over 360,000, the Czech Republic's second largest city has generally been off the map for foreign visitors. Until last week, Brno Airport only had chartered flights to southern Europe, a figure far below its potential as the historic capital of Moravia.

"There will be a huge upsurge of interest in Brno," Baldwin said. "Prague is over in the UK. Been there, done that."

Brno city officials agree.

"We are working to improve tourist services and extend offers to the [south Moravia] region," said Michal Jelinek, a tourism official from the city's strategy office. And the city plans important infrastructure improvements. Renovation work has started on tourist information centers, the historical underground, Svoboda Square and parks throughout the city. As for the airport, it will introduce direct bus services to Vienna and Ostrava and will increase public transport to the city center.

The government also has high hopes for the new Brno-London flights. CzechTourism, the national agency in charge of promoting tourism, has chosen the city of Olomouc (less than 50 miles from Brno), the Moravian wine country and the Moravian folklore festivals as future growth areas. Regional development is also on the spotlight at the Transportation Ministry. "Our priority is to develop international westbound traffic from the country's regional airports," Josef Turecky, director general for civil aviation said a few months back.

Brno Airport Director Tomas Placek has big plans. The airport official has a booked agenda, talking with 10 different European airlines -- though he declined to say which ones -- doing his best to convince them to add Brno to their network. "We have enough capacity to handle more flights and are open to all airlines," he said.

For Ryanair in Brno, the future could be promising, though the airline is cautious about prospective routes as it begins its financial 2005-06 year. "We have no experience in the Czech market but reservations have been particularly good up to now," said Ryanair's Baldwin. 17,000 tickets were already sold before the service started.

The airline is considering adding new flights to France and Italy next year. Meanwhile, the cost-conscious airline is looking to develop joint marketing campaigns with the south Moravia region, to lower marketing costs.

So what's next? The airport director wouldn't say. New flights next year? "I hope so," he conceded.



Jeremie Feinblatt can be reached at business@praguepost.com


Reader's Comments:
[21/04/2006] : As a broke student, I wanted to find the cheapest flight to Ireland as possible; thus, I took RyanAir from Brno. What a mistake! It's a three hour train ride to Brno and a half hour bus ride from the bus station to the train station. You get to the airport and you wonder if you're at a flight school - the terminal is so small. I was actually surprised there were two gates. Anyway, I wasn't the only one making this trip through Brno from Prague to London and vice versa, I would say fully half the plane was on the same journey I was on. My point is - Brno needs to upgrade it's airport, needs more English instructions & imformation booths if it ever wants to increase English tourism.
Elliot Engel
Prague
Hotel booking
The Prague Post Online contains a selection of articles that have been printed in
The Prague Post, a weekly newspaper published in the Czech Republic.
To subscribe to the print paper, click here.
Unauthorized reproduction is strictly prohibited.