Challenge
Airlines are constantly courted by airports to attract new routes – the heart blood of any airport. To do so airports must generate solid business cases extremely fast, showing how new routes will create additional business from the catchment area and through transit passengers. Traditionally, such data has been obtained from the systems that travel agencies use for booking, however, a significant part of global business no longer touches these systems.
Approach
Epinion provides clients such as Changi, Avinor, Swedavia, Brussels, Berlin, Hamburg and Munich with a completely new data source from onsite personal interviews to make up for the weakened travel agency data by adding new profiles, routes and airlines as well as triangulating data to verify findings. This data is provided in prepared formats that will allow Route Development departments to generate the majority of their business case slide decks with the push of a button.
Resolution
Airports receive detailed mapping of passenger profiles, travel patterns and business potential to be able to generate a clear overview of the make-up a new route in terms of new passengers and cannibalization of existing routes. This in turn allows airports to target the most relevant airlines based on how specific passenger profiles value specific routes and airline types. The results easily ensure a solid return on investment with just one new route added based on this business case.
