Here's the scenario: I have a route from AUA-BON. Economy sells great (usually full). Business sells great (also full), but first class is 1/6 seats lately. The kicker? Business price: $252, First Class price $254. It's not a high transfer flight (only one transfer in, zero out), so that can't be the reason Buinsess is selling better. The seats, the service, the extra flight attendant are all in first class. Other details: My flights are the only ones on this route. In ORS, my first class seats have a rating of 99, the fourth option is 35 (1-3 are this daily flight, and this 3th option is also mine with taking a boat) and twice as expensive.
So, being new- this appears that first class is very broken. I can't imagine a scenario in the real world where you could upgrade to first class for $2, and no one takes it. (The next test, in three days first class will be cheaper than business).
Is this something commonly known? Is there a factor I'm missing that make first class simply unfillable on some routes regardless of price? Thanks in advance for any help.
Just because first class is equally as cheap does not mean people take it. Each class has its own demand (from what I have deduced) and not all classes are equal.
Demand for First Class is generally much lower compared to Business Class and Economy. Some of my aircraft offer a First Class but the majority of my flights sticks with Business/Economy only. Passengers even book a higher Business Class-fare despite an available First Class with lower fares and better service. The mentioned aircraft with a First Class are doing legs with demand for First Class and legs with no demand. This is no problem as long as a healthy-booked Business/Economy generates a profit for me.
AFAIK, AS has three types of pax: eco, bizz and first. The eco pax only ever looks for eco tickets. Even if you’d offer bizz or first for 1$ he wouldn’t take it.
First class is most difficult. I’ve quite some first pax and while one route attracts plenty of bookings I get zero on others no matter what I do - had to reconfigure cabins and schedules to operate C/Y-only flights there.
Here's the passenger stats from Aspern (just grabbed):
passengers
149,562,800
economy
124,365,981
83.2%
business
24,092,097
16.1%
first
1,104,722
0.7%
cargo
18,412,156 CU
According to this, for every 112.5 passengers in Economy, there was 1 passenger in First Class. If you want to run First Class, you should only run maybe 2-4 seats on a large aircraft like a 739 or equivalent... or larger.
I can tell you, that First Class works pretty good for me. Sure, there are always routes where it simply doesn´t work, but on some routes it is even profitable to run a ATR 72-600 in three class! In my fairly small airline 85% of the planes offer a first class, and on average my f class is booked at 78% which is pretty good. However, I really do not know why, whenever I offer more than 4 F-class seats or one row in a plane, nobody books it. So I guess it just really depends on the location of your airline. Either it works, or it doesn´t. Simple as that.
Here a screenie of all my 3-class planes - and yes, it pays off :)
I can tell you, that First Class works pretty good for me. Sure, there are always routes where it simply doesn´t work, but on some routes it is even profitable to run a ATR 72-600 in three class! In my fairly small airline 85% of the planes offer a first class, and on average my f class is booked at 78% which is pretty good. However, I really do not know why, whenever I offer more than 4 F-class seats or one row in a plane, nobody books it. So I guess it just really depends on the location of your airline. Either it works, or it doesn´t. Simple as that.
Here a screenie of all my 3-class planes - and yes, it pays off :)
Can I ask you how you got such a view? I've been playing for a few months now and haven't been able to find a view yet where I see a list of my aircraft with the seat config listed for each plane...
Look at the ingame menu and find the button with the globe and the "i". Hover your mouse over it and select "Fleet lists". Select the coutry your airline is in, click on "Show" and voilà... :)
