2 new Australian long-haul LCC set to fly to Europe

[jiml1126]

2 new long-haul low-cost carriers from Australia are applying flights to Europe, via the Kangaroo route.

Backpacker Xpress has applied for 3x weekly Melbourne-Bangkok-Delhi-Manchester and 2x weekly Melbourne-Bangkok-Delhi-Munich with 747s.

Leisurejet, plans to operate A320/330s, plans to fly Sydney/Melbourne-Kuala Lumpur-Greece-Italy in Q3 2004.

[LH 340-600]

I will be interesting to see how these Longhaul LCC will do and wha kind of price and product they will offer.
I think it is very interesting to see how much pasengers need for these long flights.
I'd want to have at least meals, lots of drinks (drinks are very important due to the dry cabin air) and some IFE.

[TangoSierraVictor]

To be totally honest i'd consider flying with the carriers if i wanted to save money (and frequently i do ).

I might even be willing to accept no ife if you were allowed to take your own entertainment and use it onboard and inflight (such as gameboys, cd players, for instance).

However I think that they should give some consideration to the routings- a northern stopping point would be better. Like BNE for instance, because paying for a ticket to Melbourne on top of the fare to europe would not only increase your journey time but increase the cost of the ticket substantially.

TangoSierraVictor

[uy707]

Anyhway, seeing how the experiences will turn up will be interesting.
At first hand, two conceptions of air travel are surfacing in those project
-one call for hight density 747 flying and end of line in Manchester, good choice while flying to UK, they avoid both LHR and LGW. Their target will be obviously quantity. Odds they will need to secure a 95-100 % load to break-even.
-the other I think will be a more comfortable but probably more expensive option. Unlike Back-Packers, which hints the market target, Leisure will probably look to carve its niche in several markets ; not only backpackers and budget travellers but also with families, well-offs, vacationing excecutives and so on.
Alain