Vueling sees long-term returns from opportunistic push into new markets

Vueling CE Marco Sansavini believes the carrier’s moves to exploit new international opportunities that have emerged in the European short-haul market since the pandemic will provide long-term returns. The Spanish carrier hit breakeven in Q3 as the airline was able to increase capacity as travel restrictions within Europe began to ease. While the results marked the first time it has not lost money since the crisis hit, and outstripped those of its IAG peers Aer Lingus and British Airways, it did not match the profits recently disclosed by the low-cost units of Air France-KLM and Lufthansa. Short-haul low-cost operators have been the chief beneficiaries of the initial lifting of travel restrictions in Europe and Eurowings and Transavia posted profits of E108m ($125m) and E105m respectively for Q3. “We could have decided to just focus on domestic, and certainty that would have led to a stronger results,” Sansavini said during a third quarter IAG results briefing today, noting these were the first markets where restrictions were lifted. Nevertheless we saw opportunities for the 22 new routes we opened in the international market that were related to the fact that competitors were leaving us space in the market. That is an investment, and clearly there are restrictions that we have been through during the summer in international markets, in the UK and Italy in particular. So when you compare operators, you need to consider the weight of these two different businesses, domestic and international. For Vueling, 65% of our Q3 capacity was international... It’s an investment that we make because we believe we have the right cost structure to pursue that in the long-run.”<br/>