- The pandemic changed the habits of travelers and airlines are adapting their marketing and pricing strategies accordingly.
- Airlines are trying to guess the new normal, while investors have noticed changes and are waiting for airlines to adapt to them.
- Consumers are booking further in advance and traveling on different days.
The change in the habits of travelers after the pandemic crisis is making airlines reconfigure their marketing strategies.
Those who decide prices, connections and frequencies are trying to “guess” which of the new normal while some airlines have seen the number of trips fall,
Although the intentions to travel continue to be powerful after the covid pandemic emerged, the truth is that consumer habits are not the same as before.
This is evidenced by the decline in the shares of most airlines: investors have realized that there are changes and that the airlines have not yet been able to correctly read what is happening.
Among the changes that are taking place is the mode of ticket purchase, the number of “no-shows” of passengers has increased and the days of travel as well.
Indeed, in the United States especially, no-show rates have increased as passengers change their travel plans more frequently than before the pandemic.
Besides, the demand for tickets has fallen on mid-week days, although it has strengthened on the most used days, such as Thursday, Friday and Monday.
According to ReutersAccording to information from the United States Transportation Security Administration, passenger traffic in 2023 is down 14 percent on Tuesdays and Wednesdays, but has strengthened on Mondays and Thursdays.
In parallel, consumers are booking much further in advance compared to 2022, which means that ticket sales have moderated around the dates of the trips.
Changes in airline strategies
All of this is pushing airlines to do adjustments in their sales and pricing strategies.
For example, Frontier Airlinescut Tuesday and Wednesday flights by 20 percent, citing low demand.
According to the estimates of this airline, the change to labor agreements, which are more flexible, means that more people spend two or three days a week working in the offices (and no longer in the home office, as they did last year).
In contrast, the ultra-low-cost carrier said its revenue per available seat mile on peak days has grown above pre-pandemic data as customers are willing to pay much more for travel on other days of the week. week.
The case of United Airlines is different, since it is an airline more focused on traffic linked to business. In this case, the frequency has not fully recovered to the pre-pandemic level and its revenues remain weak.
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