How a Tiny Airline Solved Aviation's Hardest Problem

the world of commercial Aviation has never been more crowded over 5 000 airlines operate globally failing pretty much every conceivable Niche but while Airlines have mastered dozens of business models there's one segment that's remained largely untouched long-haul low-cost travel breaking into this Market has proven difficult and one might even say that it's the final frontier of commercial Aviation but Against All Odds there is one Airline who's found a legitimate foothold in this segment so who are they and how exactly are they doing it let me explain foreign hopping into it I've been doing a lot of traveling in 2023 I've visited five different countries all in the name of checking out cool planes and making my videos better for all of you with all of this traveling I've learned a lot about different cultures and it had me wondering whether I had any connection to these places well good thing for my Heritage today's sponsor by inputting just the names of my parents and grandparents my Heritage helped me to fill out my family tree drawing on millions of records at their disposal it was able to help me track back all the way to my great great grandparents and to my surprise I learned that my family is actually from Latvia my Heritage offers some other really cool features as well like DNA testing and the ability to enhance old photos just check out this photo of my late grandfather learning to drive myheritage helped to restore the quality of the photo and it even colorized it right now my Heritage is offering a 14 day free trial of their amazing platform and if you want to stay subscribed after those 14 days my viewers will get an additional 50 off so if you want to support me and the work that I do please consider checking out myheritage at the link below first let's talk about the rise of low-cost travel its popularity has exploded in recent years and a recent analysis found that 36 percent of all scheduled flights are now served by low-cost carriers and the three biggest lccs Southwest Ryanair and indigo carried over 200 million passengers in 2021 but while low-cost travel has grown tremendously these flights are almost always short haul long-haul low-cost flights are elusive which seems a bit odd after all our world is becoming more globalized and interconnected and people's appetite to travel is at an all-time high so why are these flights so rare well simply put the business model is notoriously difficult to sustain and while there are dozens of reasons why this is we're gonna focus on the three biggest factors first up the cost of fuel the amount amount of fuel that an aircraft Burns tends to grow exponentially with distance which makes long-haul flights quite expensive to operate as a result Airlines need to charge higher fares in order to turn a profit on Long missions which is antithetical to the low-cost business model second you have the costs associated with long-range aircraft long duration flights demand big planes and unsurprisingly these aircraft are expensive the 787-9 for instance which is the world's most popular wide body jet costs nearly three times as much as the A320 Neo which is the world's most popular narrow body to make matters worse wide-body aircraft are more expensive to repair and maintain and since these jets are so big these repairs can take a long time to complete meaning they spend less time in the air making money third you have Personnel costs big play remains need big Crews and with an industry-wide labor shortage taking hold employing pilots and cabin Crews has grown costly on top of that Crews who fly long distances often Traverse several time zones in an effort to limit fatigue Regulators demand that long-haul Crews receive extra rest between flights this complicates Crew Scheduling and forces Airlines to hire even more people further driving up costs these are just a few of the things that make long-haul travel so expensive and until recently no low-cost carrier has managed to circumvent these challenges recent attempts by the likes of wow and Norwegian came close but both ultimately failed but these cautionary tales didn't stop French Bee from entering this segment this paris-based carrier has embraced long-haul low-cost travel from day one their average sector length is over 8 000 kilometers but their fears are usually half that of full service carriers and their early returns have been promising they've been flying for about seven years now they managed to turn a profit a fair few times during that stretch so what exactly is French be doing differently well they've employed three key strategies to enable success first up they have a unique Fleet of aircraft French bee is a champion of Fleet commonality the practice of flying just a single aircraft type this helps an airline streamline things like aircraft repairs and crew training which leads to savings that can be passed off to customers now French bee isn't the only airline that employs this strategy but they are the only ones who fly nothing but the Airbus a350 the a350 is one of the most modern and fuel-efficient aircraft on Earth which helps French be save a whole lot of money on fuel up to 25 compared to competing Jets and their a350s are brand spanking new with an average age of just four years old they really don't need a lot of maintenance even as these planes grow older and Shop visits become more frequent costs should remain low that's because the a350 is equipped with a whole host of predictive maintenance features which should help the airline speed up repairs the second way that French bee has realized success has come from the Simplicity of its root Network all but one of their flights either originate or terminate out of Paris this means all of their pilots and all of their attendants are based in the same location giving the airline tremendous flexibility when it comes to Crew Scheduling in addition the destinations they fly to are purposeful they serve major tourist destinations like New York and la and popular vacation spots like Punta Cana and Tahiti this allows for predictable and sustained levels of traffic and when they visit these locations they tend to stick to secondary airports for instance their Paris Hub is based at Orly Airport rather than the the more congested and expensive Charles de Gaulle and when they fly to New York they use nearby Newark airport instead of JFK to keep slot fees low the third and arguably most important tool in frenchbees Arsenal is their unique cabin configuration the Airbus a350 was originally designed to seat nine people per Row in economy but French beef lies there's ten abreast this strategy helps the carrier fit 411 seats on board their a350 900s and a whopping 480 seats aboard their a350 1000s as a point of comparison Qatar Airways who was the launch customer of the a350 fits just 283 and 327 seats onto theirs even low-cost competitor North Atlantic only manages to fit 338 seats aboard their comparably sized Boeing 787s with so many seats on board frenchby is able to distribute their operating costs across more passengers this lowers the break even fair price allowing the airline to offer true low-cost prices as low as 199 dollars one way while still turning a healthy profit now before moving on we have to address the elephant in the room this high density layout is vital to French B's success but it's also drawn plenty of criticism we live in a world where people are getting bigger and folks aren't exactly pleased that seats keep shrinking if people wise up to French bees tender breast setup customer satisfaction could plummet and demand could run dry suffice it to say this would be catastrophic for the airline but this concern all hinges on whether or not people can actually tell the difference between 9 and 10 of rest so in order to find out just how big a difference it makes I hopped on a French beef light myself now I've had the privilege of doing a lot of fly I've flown a lot of wide body aircraft and a lot of different airlines and while French Beast seats are more snug than what I'm used to it's not nearly as bad as I expected perhaps I shouldn't have been surprised after all French Beast seats are about 16 and a half inches wide this is only about a half an inch thinner than what you'd find on Triple sevens and 787s that are flown by Mainline carriers now frequent flyers may be able to tell the difference but most people probably won't that's especially true for families traveling with smaller children who are a prime target for French bees discounted fares I also found that the amount of legroom that French bee offers really helps to counterbalance their thinner seats they offer 32 inches of legroom in economy which is more than mainliners like British Airways Air France and thin air now I don't know about you but but if I had to pick between more seat width and more leg room I'm picking leg room 10 times out of 10. of course seats aren't the end-all be-all of the in-flight experience things like the meal service in-flight entertainment and the modernity of the aircraft all play a role and French be impresses in all of these areas their Ife system is modern and easy to navigate plus it's free which is a nice per tray budget carrier the onboard food while a separate charge was hearty and tasty and of course frenchbees a350s are exceedingly clean and quiet and are pressurized to a lower cabin altitude so you feel less jet lagged but the biggest surprise of the French bee experience was the service this is a major sticking point for many budget carriers with more than a few drawing scrutiny for mistreating their customers now the crew aboard my front B flight were attentive kind and professional this was a refresh rushing experience to say the least and it goes to show that you don't need to be a fancy schmancy airline to treat your customers with dignity and respect at the end of the day I think concerns about French bees high density layout are overblown passengers might be able to tell that there's less space on board but they will definitely be able to tell how much cheaper their ticket is I think most Travelers would prefer to have that extra cash on hand to spend on their vacation if that's really the case and French B can keep up this momentum they may prove to be a true Pioneer in this notoriously difficult Market segment so what do you guys think would you ever fly French be yourself let me know your thoughts in the comments section below also if you're interested in learning more about the viability of 10 breast a350s well I've got a video covering just that I'll be sure to leave a link to it right below that like button thank you so much much to my patrons for helping to make this video possible if you like what I do and want to help the channel grow go ahead and check out this link right here and as always if you learned something new today leave a like And subscribe to keep learning and until I see you again don't forget to look up foreign

Channel: Coby Explanes

Views: 301,551

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Id: dDtARcpY4dE

Length: 12min 45sec (765 seconds)

Published: Fri Sep 29 2023