I operate on Meigs in Algeria as al-Jazair. I have a competitor that I only discovered after I had scheduled my first 5 ATR's who started half a week before me; Algiers Airways.
I can see what routes he serves and I have tried to avoid those, but he is sapping part of the domestic market, and as I have read about, it is essential for starting. All I can see is his destination, number of flights and seats offered.
I currently do not fly to a 10-bar airport, but he does (FCO). Should I fly to some high passenger demand airport and get some traffic to my hub (maybe Barcelona?). My fleet is 7 ATR-42 and 5 ATR-72 (small prop planes, low fuel consumption, but small cap (max 48, 74). I fly to 2bar and 3bar airports and they are all linked to my hub, and sub hubs, Algiers, Oran, Constantine (ALG,ORN,CZL).
Do you have any advice? For destination in common should I compete in price or service rating?
Routes in common are (departing from ALG) too many...
Point to notice; he operates flights twice per day every day to each destination.
Is that what I should do with my destinations with significant demand?
You can compete on service, seats, prices, aircraft, or the combination thereof. You need to build up connections and have better connection ratings tan him (in connection rating,s total trip time plays additional important factor).
It says I have to purchase credits to do that...I'm not sure if I want to continue playing, although very tempted, I'm just trying this game out. Once you start paying it never really ends until you decide to quit...but I guess that's what you have to pay for an advanced simulation game that features so many complex and real components in constant development.
If you only fly to 2 and 3 bar airports you wont get much profit, as these should be feeder airpots meant to give your hub passengers to connect to your more important flights. You need to fly to the big airports, even if there is competition.
Algeria has a historical connection to France, so that (as well as the neighbouring North African nations) might be a good place to start once you have connected your domestic traffic (and by the way, at the start its best to stick to just one hub for easier connections)
I can only recommend purchasing a "small batch" of credits first. This way you can get a feeling for the important features (Online Reservation System!) that make the game a complex simulation. You also get more information.
I see you’ve already started expanding to principal european markets with your ATR fleet. I have no idea what your loads are like but I’d recommend upguaging those routes to a larger regional jet aiming for something in the 737/32S class as growth allows. From my experience ATRs are almost unbeatable on domestic markets with limited competition but once they’re put on International routes against bigger jets flown by the larger airlines they become much harder to fill. Especially so on an established server like Meigs.
Another hint I can give is where possible try to lease aircraft from the second hand market even if they’re several years old you can save quite a bit on leases which is a big help with a start up. I had a fleet of 14-15 year old Boeing 717s on cheap leases and got some pretty good returns on the right sort of markets.
Algeria has a historical connection to France, so that (as well as the neighbouring North African nations) might be a good place to start once you have connected your domestic traffic (and by the way, at the start its best to stick to just one hub for easier connections)
This is an important hint - France is your main market in Europe, Spain most likely will not work for now as you don't have built a strong network yet (Greece and Italy neither). Tunesia and Marocco first, then France and in a while more destinations. Check which destinations exist in real world from Algiers and focus first on the domestic / near African market.
This all needs some time... but it is worth to wait until your network starts to work and your routes start to fill. Then you can start expansion - my recommendation. :-)
Right, thank you guys for the info, by the way, I think he's stopped playing now because he runs multiple (I'm guessing) empty flights per day to destinations, clearly on a deficit. My financial rating is AA, what is the best way to test routes out?
My financial rating is AA, what is the best way to test routes out?
By that I meant, that I am running operations at a profit and am now in search of new destination, especially as the flights to my secondary hubs were virtually empty. I am focusing on France, have tried but failed with Italy (very low load factor even with no competition and decent rating) as well as in Portugal. Connecting Madrid and Barcelona to my hub, but have dropped regular flights to Tunisia because they were generally empty. What is the most cost-efficient way to test a new route out?
I see you've already started expanding to principal european markets with your ATR fleet. I have no idea what your loads are like but I'd recommend upguaging those routes to a larger regional jet aiming for something in the 737/32S class as growth allows. From my experience ATRs are almost unbeatable on domestic markets with limited competition but once they're put on International routes against bigger jets flown by the larger airlines they become much harder to fill. Especially so on an established server like Meigs.
Sorry but this makes no sense. You’re saying an ATR will be hard to fill, so you recommend changing to something larger? If he can’t fill an ATR how can he fill a 737?
Maybe he means that with the 5 bar rating of a jet as opposed to 2 bar for an ATR it is easier to get a higher rating and therefore to fill. Moreover, it's better to serve medium haul routes with jets because they are much faster compared to props. Anyways, how can I get my planes to fill on routes with no competition, i.e. Milan, Palermo? I have decent rating and good price performance ratio yet I only get a couple of people on the plane.
...Anyways, how can I get my planes to fill on routes with no competition, i.e. Milan, Palermo? I have decent rating and good price performance ratio yet I only get a couple of people on the plane.
Connections, connections,connections...
If there’s no or little direct demand, you can do whatever. You could offer Luxury Suites for 1$ yet wouldn’t get a single pax extra.
So, if you want to fill them, feed pax and/or get some good interlining agreements.
Maybe he means that with the 5 bar rating of a jet as opposed to 2 bar for an ATR it is easier to get a higher rating and therefore to fill. Moreover, it's better to serve medium haul routes with jets because they are much faster compared to props. Anyways, how can I get my planes to fill on routes with no competition, i.e. Milan, Palermo? I have decent rating and good price performance ratio yet I only get a couple of people on the plane.
Aircraft type has no direct impact on product rating. It affects image, and that'll affect the rating of future flights (but the effect is diluted with every other flight you've ever had).
For the beginning I think it's best to forget about the destinations that don't get filled. If you get very few passengers on routes with no competition, then probably there aren't many passengers who want to fly directly. Best to drop those routes for now and focus on the ones that have demand, and in the future, once you have lots of connecting flights, you may want to try those routes again with more connecting passengers.
Try to search what airports Algerian airlines fly to in real life, that's probably a good indication of where the demand might be.
Build your network with Algeria, Tunesia, Marocco and France - nothing else at the moment! Is this so hard to understand?
Don't go for Italy, Greece, Portugal or other destinations - Algerians speak French and will not fly to Greece or to Italy or to Portugal or to Spain. There is no demand in real life and so won't be here unless you have built a very strong network - then you can fly wherever you want to and it is possible to fill your planes.
This takes a lot of time - and is not possible with a test account.