Everyone who follows the aviation market knows that 2021 was a complicated year for the sector, with little horizon for the future and a big impact from the second wave, right after an even more complicated 2020 that melted airline reservations.
While some airlines reduced in size or even closed their doors, others took advantage of the troubled period to gain a lot of market.
Cirium gathered some data from that period, and listed worldwide which were the successful cases during the last two years. Check the list below:
- The main Low Cost airlines in Mexico took advantage of the Judicial Reorganization of Aeromexico , as well as the steady demand for leisure from US tourists, and grew over the period.
- Bamboo Airways, Vietnam's airline, which was already experiencing rapid growth before the pandemic, has maintained constant fleet growth even in the last two years.
- Taking advantage of Alitalia's gap in the market, and other European carriers, Ryanair has grown aggressively in Italy.
- Sichuan Airlines grew, but the additional supply was largely handled by its subsidiary Chengdu Airlines.
- Recently announcing a merger, Frontier and Spirit Airlines of the United States, took advantage of the downturn for large airlines to expand their fleet, number of seats and flights. Americans' desire for cheaper seats also contributed to this expansion.
- SkyExpress has added Airbus A320neo planes to challenge Aegean Air, which has reduced its fleet, in the large Greek tourist market. It is worth mentioning that the tourist market was high during the pandemic.
- Juneyao expanded its low-cost division, 9 Air, in China.
Other airlines that started during the pandemic, such as Breeze and Avelo in the United States, also expanded the offer of flights in the period, taking advantage of the vacuum of large airlines and unserved markets.
In Brazil, as we previously published, Azul Linhas Aéreas expanded the number of seats offered and fleet in 2021, compared to 2019. In the accumulated result for the year, the company jumped from 3rd to 2nd.
Check the details of the growth of each airline in the table below:
Which airlines have had the biggest decline in seats over the past two years?
Unlike the list above, many airlines have had to abruptly reduce their flight offerings in recent years. According to Cirium data, Delta, easyJet and Emirates led the way in this regard.
Delta retired many older planes from its fleet between 2020 and 2021, greatly reducing the amount of capacity on offer.
Emirates' business was largely affected, as its pillar is international flights between countries and borders were closed for most of 2021.
However, Cirium points out that other giant companies globally, such as North American and European, had the biggest drop after these three airlines. The worst cases in percentage are concentrated in Southeast Asia, including Cathay Pacific, AirAsia and Thai Airways.
To this day, Cathay Pacific has most of its fleet on the ground. Currently, 800 seats are offered on average per day, despite the company having more than 170 aircraft in its fleet.
Another movement worth mentioning is between large groups of airlines. The “traditional ones”, such as Air and Aeroflot, withdrew their offer, while they added in their subsidiaries Transavia and Pobeda, respectively. In our view, this reveals another characteristic of the market: Consumers in the tourism market are looking for lower prices every day.
