Latvian carrier opening new revenue streams to balance drop in traffic

Published: 25-03-2022 Latvian carrier opening new revenue streams to balance drop in traffic

Mar 25, 2022 (newstodate): First Covid-19 and now the impact from Russia's invasion of Ukraine: the Latvian carrier airBaltic is fighting a hard battle in a troubled market.
   Bookings at airBaltic dropped by some 30 percent in the first week after the invasion in Ukraine, and the carrier is taking a deep blow; first airBaltic  laid down its flights to Russia from March 4, 2022, and now all flights to Ukraine with destinations Odessa, Kiev and Lvov are suspended since March 24 as well.
   Together, this will exert a strong pressure on profits, forcing the carrier to open, or enhance the focus on, other revenue streams.
   One is the opening of airBaltic's first base outside the Baltic region: Tampere, in Finland, where the carrier will  base one Airbus A220-300 aircraft to build up a network of connections to Oslo starting from May 2, 2022, with three weekly rotations; to Copenhagen from May 3, 2022, with three weekly rotations; to Frankfurt and Munich from May 2, 2022, with three weekly flights, and to leisure destinations Malaga and Rhodes from May 1 and 3, 2022, respectively, with two weekly flights.
   Flights connecting Tampere and Riga Airport have been operated since 2017, now as an all-year service with up to six weekly rotations.
   Another stream of revenues is wet-lease contracts with other operators; so far, airBaltic has dedicated nine Airbus A220-300 aircraft to this business, which has generated a contract with Eurowings comprising five aircraft. Another airline wet-lease customer with airBaltic is SAS.
   airBaltic is also active in the charter business, including a fresh contract, announced only yesterday, with the international tour operator Tez Tour Latvija for charter flights from Riga for the upcoming summer season, which will include leisure destinations like Antalya in Turkey, Burgas in Bulgaria and Araxos in Peloponnese, Greece.
   This summer, airBaltic will be offering flights to a total of 92 destinations from its bases at Riga, Tallinn, Vilnius and Tampere.
   64 of the destinations will be served from Riga, 13 destinations from Tallinn, 12 destinations from Vilnius, as well as seven destinations from Tampere.

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