1. Introduction:
International Air Transport Association experts say that the amount of passenger will have grown to 7.2 billion passengers in 2035 worldwide; this is an average growth of 3.7 percent per year (pressroom IATA, 2016). With this growth, there is a need for more aircrafts in the air, for these additional passengers. This will cause potential problems, especially in the Netherlands; those problems are capacity, space in the air and noise. Because there will take off and land more aircrafts, the noise level will increase and this is more than the people that live near airports will tolerate. Because of this, the government of the Netherlands has set a limit on the numbers of aircrafts at the Schiphol airport. Schiphol cannot grow beyond 500,000 aircraft movements until 2020 (Pieters, 2017); this limit has almost been reached in the year 2017, as Schiphol had 497,000 aircraft movements (Nijhuis). With this in mind, the tour operators that will operate in the Netherlands will divert to regional airports in for example Eindhoven or Rotterdam.
With this set maximum the question asked by P. van Oord at the department flight planning “Capacity and Traffic”, if it wise to position an extra aircraft on Eindhoven airport? The goal of this project is to research what the dangers and opportunities are to station an additional aircraft or is it a better solution to buy in capacity from another airline. It is important to do this research because a wrong decision can lead to losses for TUI Netherlands.
This report has the following structure. The second chapter will give more information about what the problem is and why this research has been assigned. In this chapter, a company analysis will be given. The main and sub-questions will be presented. Chapter 3 will elaborate on the theoretical framework and research design. In chapter 4 will be described what the problem that occurs at Schiphol airport and why Eindhoven airport is an option that needs to be taken into account. Chapter 5 will give more information about the catchment area of Eindhoven airport and will be elaborated what TUI Netherlands will offer for destinations from Eindhoven airport. Chapter 6 will give more detail about the competition that TUI is facing at Eindhoven airport. In chapter 7 will elaborated on how passengers can be attracted to Eindhoven airport. Chapter 8 will give more information about the possible threats, which can occur. Chapter 9 is the conclusion from this research. In chapter 10, the result will be discussed. Chapter 11 will give a recommendation for TUI Netherlands for the problem.
2. Theoretical framework:
This chapter first introduces the problem what TUI Netherlands faces on Schiphol. Second, the research questions will be given. Third, the study scope and type will be elaborated further. As fourth, a company analysis of TUI Netherlands will give more information on what sort of company TUI Netherlands is.
2.1 Problem definition:
The government of the Netherlands has set a maximum of 500,000 aircraft movements until 2020 from Schiphol airport (Pieters, 2017). The problem for many airlines is that there are not enough slots left to grow. A slot is a permission to use the entire infrastructure that an airport has to offer and is available only at the time and date what the airline applied for (Slots, 2018). Because of the limit at Schiphol airport, the airline of TUI Netherlands, also called TUI fly, relocated to the regional airport of Eindhoven. The reason that TUI Netherlands is relocating for their Medium-haul flights is that there is potential to grow, because on the regional airports there are still slots available for TUI fly the airline of TUI Netherlands.
2.2 Research Question:
The problem that will be stated in the above section reveals the lack of potential growth for TUI Netherlands. To address these Issues the following Research question has been formulated:
“What are the dangers and opportunities for TUI Netherlands if an additional aircraft will be positioned on Eindhoven airport?”
To answer the main research question the following sub-questions have been formulated:
- Why should TUI Netherlands go to Eindhoven Airport and what is the problem at Schiphol Airport?
- Which destinations do the potential customers go to in the summer season from Eindhoven airport in the Netherlands?
- Who is the competition of TUI Netherlands at Eindhoven airport and what are their summer destinations?
- What should TUI Netherlands do to get passengers to Eindhoven airport instead of Schiphol Airport, looking at flight days, flight times and destinations?
2.3 Study scope and type:
The aim of this report is to make a recommendation if there are opportunities to position an additional aircraft at Eindhoven airport. The project includes an analysis of who is the competitor and what their destinations are. It will also include an analysis of what kind of destinations the passengers fly to from the regional airport in Eindhoven. In this project, the European destinations will be taken in to account. The project will also have an idea of how TUI Netherlands can attract passengers to fly from Eindhoven airport instead of Schiphol airport. Besides, of keeping the previous examples in consideration, the long-haul destinations will not be a part of this project. The assumption for this project will be that there are enough passengers to transport from Eindhoven airport to multiple medium-haul destinations. For the outcome, the limitations that could occur for the final recommendation is that the market is already satisfied to can accommodate the extra passengers.
The type of this project is a combination of an explanatory and exploratory research. The reason why this is a combination of the two is that this research exploratory if there is enough growth to station an additional aircraft.
2.4 Company analysis:
TUI Netherlands finds its roots from 1876 with the establishment of Lisonne. This makes that TUI Netherlands is not only the biggest in the market but also the first tour operator that is operating from the Netherlands. In 1974, it merged with Holland International and became the biggest tour operator of the Netherlands. In the nineties, Arke and Holland International are taken over by TUI AG. The reorganization, TUI Netherlands is established in 1997. Their own airline is established in 2005 and is called Arkefly and with establishing their own airline they were the first tour operator in the Netherlands with their own airline. TUI AG merged with the British First Choice Holidays PLC in 2007. After they merged a new international strategy applied and different TUI Travel Company are clustering. In 2014; TUI Travel PLC and TUI AG merge into the now known TUI Group. Also in 2014 TUI Netherlands and TUI Belgium is clustering in TUI Benelux. Since 1 October 2015, the name of Arke has been changed in TUI. This has been done to form one powerful brand all around the world (Over TUI Nederland). TUI Netherlands is the role model for the international TUI Group.
TUI offers affordable sun holidays located around the Mediterranean Sea and intercontinental holidays, city trips, winter sport, round trips, cruises and car holidays. TUI offers for every traveler their perfect holiday.
Airline TUI fly has nine aircrafts in their fleet. The fleet consists of three Boeing 787 with 305 seats, one Boeing 767 with 279 seats and five Boeing 737-800 with 183 seats. TUI fly is flying to more than 60 destinations all around the world.
TUI Netherlands SWOT analysis
Strengths
– Have their own airline and hotels
– TUI offers products for every passenger
– Have their own charity foundation (TUI care foundation)
Weakness
– Internal systems are not ready to sell from Belgium and German airports
– Do not give the opportunity to the passenger to fly from Belgium or Germany
Opportunities
– Offer a unique destination compared to the competition
– TUI Netherlands is working to sustainable image
Threats
– Losing passengers because TUI Netherlands does not offer destinations from airports in Belgium or Germany
Table 1: SWOT-analysis TUI Netherlands
From the SWOT-analyses for TUI Netherlands can be seen that TUI Netherlands has their own airline and hotels this means that TUI Netherlands can hold the passengers in their product. This will result with higher profit margins. TUI Netherlands has a variety of destinations; they offer 23 destinations from only Eindhoven airport. The weakness of TUI Netherlands is the internal system in comparison with the competition. The internal systems are not able yet to sell directly from the allotment of TUI Belgium or TUI Germany. This will eventually lead to losing potential passengers to other markets.
2.4.1 Strategy
The strategy of TUI Netherlands is that they go further to surpass their passengers expectations. That is why the slogan of TUI Netherlands is “Discover your smile”. The letters of TUI stand for Trusted, Unique, and Inspiring. These letters will form the smile by their passengers (Over TUI Nederland bedijfsprofiel).
2.4.2 Structure
Because TUI Netherlands is a big multinational with many different departments, the focus of the structure will be on the department
Capacity & Traffic.
The department Capacity and traffic is responsible for optimizing the flight capacity of TUI fly and third parties airlines. The department of Airline Purchasing carries out the purchase of third party airlines. If this has been purchased then the department of Capacity and Traffic will make sure that the flights can be booked for the passengers. The flights that will be taken care of are the allotment flights. This department will not handle the flights that will be booked via Amadeus. Amadeus is a computer reservation system, that will make it able to manage all distribution channels (Amadeus CRS). After the flights are in the sale system with their correct flight schedule and contract, they need to be taken care of to get the optimal distribution. When the flight is getting near their release date the long-haul flights needs to be locked so that the customers cannot book that flight. The passengers list will be send to another department where the passengers will be booked in Negospace. Negospace is an inventory system (Amadeus Negiotiated Space).
If there is, a flight overbooked or due to maintenance and the aircraft will be changed for example a TUI fly Belgium aircraft. Then this department will inform the customer service center, customer service and tour guide over flight changes. This can up- or downgrades rebook to a different flight or change in flight time
2.4.3 Relevance of the project
Because the set limit of aircraft movement that is operative at Schiphol airport and there is not enough potential growth for TUI Netherlands. The logical choice for TUI Netherlands is to expand their operations from the regional airports like Eindhoven or Rotterdam. To station an additional will bring not only opportunities but will also dangers what TUI Netherlands has to deal with.
3. Methodological framework:
In this, the methodological framework will be elaborated. First, the research design gives more information about what sort of researches there will be used in this report. Second, on what sort of data and analysis is been used during the research.
3.1 Research design:
This study is exploratory, as it aims to come up with a recommendation if TUI Netherlands profitable to station an additional aircraft on Eindhoven airport and will be based on literature and data that is available from TUI. With this research is to strive for further potential growth for TUI Netherlands at the regional airport. First, the problem was further elaborated and why should TUI Netherlands needs to relocate to Eindhoven airport. Based on the problem what has occurred at Schiphol airport a destination analysis and competitor analysis has been developed. To what destinations TUI and competitors fly can be found in Appendixes 1 until 4.
A combination of desk research and comparative research are been used to understand the background and come to the right conclusion. Desk research is used to collect the data that is already available and will give a base for the other type of research. By using comparative studies the will help to compare with different nations or cultures (Comparative Research Methods). The reason for this is that in the catchment area not only Dutch potential passengers live but also Belgium and German.
3.2 Data collection and analysis:
This study uses data, which is a combination of data, that is available on the Internet and data that is provided by TUI Netherlands and TUI fly. TUI Netherlands provided the amount seats that they offer for 2018. This eventually leads in the top 10 destinations for the number of seats that TUI Netherlands offers from Eindhoven airport.
For this kind of research, the analysis what has been used are SWOT-analyses for the competition of TUI Netherlands that offer holidays from Eindhoven airport. This tool will give a proper overview of the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats of the competition and from TUI Netherlands themselves (SWOT analysis). Another analysis that has been used is a risk analysis with this analysis the risk where identified that TUI Netherlands can have to deal with if they station an additional aircraft at Eindhoven airport.
4. Why should TUI Netherlands go to Eindhoven airport and what is the problem at Schiphol airport?
The problems on Schiphol will lead that TUI Netherlands is forced to grow on the regional airport of Eindhoven. But what is Eindhoven airport like and why should TUI go there. This will be further elaborated in this chapter.
To come back shortly on the problem on what is going on Schiphol airport. Because of the noise pollution from the aircraft that take off and land at Schiphol airport, the government set a limit of 500,000 aircrafts movements. Until these aircraft movements can Schiphol airport grow until 2020. Also Eindhoven airport has a set limit. The airport of Eindhoven can grow in steps to a maximum of 43,000 aircraft movements in 2019, this is only possible because Eindhoven airport kept their agreement to reduce noise disturbance (Eindhoven airport news). In 2017, the number of aircraft movements was around 36,470 (routesonline). The Airport expects for 2018 an increase of eight percent this will lead to 39,500 aircraft movements (Eindhoven airport news).
Eindhoven airport movements will grow with 3,500 aircraft for 2019. As of April 18, 2018, TUI fly can use 438 slots for take-off and land at Eindhoven airport. These slots are for their summer season of 2018. Nowadays, TUI fly only uses 414 slots. The remaining 24 slots will not be used this season and will be giving them back to the slot coordinator. These slots can be used from 07:00 – 00:00 LT. The aircraft can take-off only until 23:00 LT and between 23:00 – 00:00 LT can only have five Landings allowed (Algemene informatie Eindhoven airport).
For Schiphol airport, the total amount of departures and arrivals for the whole summer season 2018 has been set at 313,740 movements executed during the day. The number of departures and arrivals during the night are 22,000 movements and can increase to 23,219 movements. All these slots have to be divided for all the airlines that will fly on Schiphol, via the same procedures as describe in the next paragraph. The night departure slot applies from 22:40 – 06:59 LT and the night arrival slot applies from 23:00 – 07:19 LT (AMS capacity declaration, 2017).
Airport Coordination Netherlands (ACNL) is responsible for the slot allocation for the airports of Amsterdam, Rotterdam, and Eindhoven. ACNL is the only organization in the Netherlands that can allocate slots. The slot allocations are in accordance with the European Council Regulation 95/93, ACNL takes in to account the IATA Worldwide Slot Guidelines (slotcoordination, 2017). The European Council Regulation 95/93 has been set up in the 1990s for the continuous growth of the aviation industry because there was pressure on the available capacity. The procedure to allocate slots to an airline is as follows: the first deadline is for the SHL and this deadline is based on the historic slots from the previous equivalent season. Those historic slots are calculated from use and cancellation of the slots that have been used in previous season. After the historic slots are agreed upon, then the initial submission deadline occurs. In this period, TUI fly needs to submit their slot request for the equivalent season. The slot request contains the confirmation of their historic slots and the request for new slots. Between the Initial Submission and the SAL deadline, the slot coordinators can make appointments with the airline about the slots they requested. At the SAL deadline, the slot coordinator will inform TUI fly if the request has been confirmed or if the slots will not be allocated. If a slot cannot be allocated to TUI fly, the slot coordinator will give an alternative if this is possible. After around two weeks after receiving this message, an IATA slot conference will be held. At this conference, TUI fly can make an appointment with the slot coordinator to analyze if it is possible to change the allocated slot (Slot coordination process, 2010) (calender coordination activities).
Because Eindhoven airport is a regional airport the Turn-around process for an aircraft of TUI fly that has a load factor of 100 percent is 42 percent cheaper than at Amsterdam Schiphol. For an aircraft that has a 90% load factor is 44 percent cheaper for their turn around process. Another advantage is of Eindhoven airport is that the airplanes use less fuel this is because the airport of Eindhoven is also 125 km south of Schiphol. Eindhoven accommodates nowadays many Low-Cost Carries and the only competition that has the same business model like TUI is Corendon. The airlines that will operate the most are Ryanair, Wizzair, Transavia, Corendon, and TUI.
Not only for the tour operator but also for the passengers Eindhoven airport has more advantage. The passengers can park nearby the terminal it is only a 7 minutes’ walk and the passengers have a choice if they want to park the car in a covered parking garage or a non-covered parking garage only for the parking lot P8 is a free shuttle bus available. The parking cost at Eindhoven airport is between 56 euro up to 88 euros. (parkeren eindhoven) To compare the cost for Eindhoven airport and Schiphol. The cost of parking a car for one week it is between 67.50 euros up to 332.50 euros for Schiphol. If the passengers will go for the cheapest option then they have to take a bus to the terminal and this bus ride is 10 minutes. (parkeren op Schiphol)
Because Eindhoven airport is a regional airport they will process fewer passengers it is less busy and smaller then Schiphol. This has an advantage that it is not a journey before fly. This will lead to another advantage that there are no long queues at the check-in counters. (Veelgestelde vragen eindhoven airport)
5. Which destinations do the potential customers go to in the summer season from Eindhoven airport in the Netherlands?
To give a proper recommendation for this project, there needs to be proper data of the age structure of where the passengers come from (province). Each age group has their own interest of where they want to go, and these interests determine their destination. This will be elaborated in the following section.
5.1 Eindhoven catchment area:
After Schiphol, the airport of Eindhoven is the second largest airport in the Netherlands and served almost 5.7 million passengers in 2017 with a predicted 6 million users by 2019. These passengers come in three varieties: Leisure, Visiting Friends and Relatives (VFR) and business passengers. The leisure passengers are the most important group for TUI for their Medium haul destinations, accounting for 50% of all the passengers that traveled via Eindhoven Airport. Passengers visiting friends and relatives account for 28%, and business passengers account for 18% (Eindhoven airport).
The catchment area of Eindhoven airport consists of almost eight million inhabitants within just a one-hour drive and 38 million inhabitants within a two hour-drive-. Due to the location of Eindhoven, the airport will serve not only passengers from the Netherlands but also from Belgium and Germany.
As of 2015, Eindhoven consisted of 156 nationalities. The top five nationalities where: Dutch, Polish, Turkish, Indian and Chinese. This high density of nationalists is from what companies call “Brainport”. The Brainport is a highly developed technology region where a substantial number of multinationals are located.
Because Eindhoven airport is located in the south of the Netherlands, it also attracts Belgium passengers’, which make up 4% of the total in 2015. This percentage has grown to 11% in 2017. Most Belgium passengers are coming out of the provinces Antwerp. Around 75% of all the Dutch passengers are coming mainly from the southern part of the Netherlands. These factors cause the catchment area of Eindhoven airport to function differently than the Amsterdam Schiphol (catchment area and demographic).
For Eindhoven airport, the people that live in the province North-Brabant are important for their passenger numbers, which makes 38% of all the Dutch passengers. The age structure of North-Brabant can be seen in figure 2 that most of the people that live in the province of North-Brabant are around the age of 50.
Table 2: Age structure (CBS statline)
As can be seen in the diagrams above, the biggest population is between 20 to 65 years old for both men and women. In the southern provinces of Netherlands, North-Brabant is the largest of the three and has the largest number of inhabitants. The expectation is that in the future, more elderly and less young people will be living in North-Brabant. The distribution can be seen in Appendix 5. As the population gets older, this could have an influencing on the demands of where the population wants to go. This is because older populations will have different interest than the younger population (kiosken).
The top 10 destinations of Eindhoven Airport as can be seen in figure 3; these are used as leisure destinations such as a city trip or for a longer holiday. London was used mostly for business trips and city trips. Barcelona is a popular destination that was mostly used for city trips. The most common destinations for passengers at Eindhoven airport were all based in Spain.
Figure 3: Top 10 destinations Eindhoven airport
5.2 TUI Netherlands:
For the following sub-paragraph, there will be given a detailed look on where the passengers of TUI Netherlands come from and where their go to. It is important to have an idea if there are enough passengers to fill the aircraft.
According to TUI Netherlands, the passengers that booked a holiday to the Canary Islands. Around 8.8% of these passengers that have booked a package. This means that the passenger has booked a hotel and airplane ticket. For the passengers that have booked only a flight ticket is this percentage is around 12.1%. The 12.1% for a flight ticket and the 8.8% for the package are the numbers of people that are coming from the surroundings of Eindhoven Airport and the other 87.9% for flight ticket and 91.2% for package have a further destination. Figure 4 is the distribution of the other destinations that will be flown to the Canary Islands. The surroundings of Eindhoven is coming from the postcodes that start from 50 until 59 this can be found in figure 5. All these percentages are for their summer season. For the research that TUI did for La Palma (SPC) 5,775 passengers have booked a holiday. For this destination, 2,414 from the total of 5,775 passengers are coming for the provinces North-Holland and South Holland. These two provinces have a total of 6.46 million inhabitants. This means that those two provinces are good for around 40% of all the inhabitants of the Netherlands. The Canary Island is the biggest holiday market for TUI Netherlands. What can be made up of this research for the destination SPC and the other Canary Islands is that the biggest numbers of passengers are coming from further destinations instead of the surroundings of Eindhoven. This will lead that the passengers need to get attracted to fly from Eindhoven airport.
Figure 4: Part passengers Eindhoven and surroundings
Also for the destination Antalya, 87.7% of the passengers have a further origin. The other 12.3 percent are coming from postcodes that start with 50 until 59 and is defined as Eindhoven and surroundings. In the three provinces where the most passengers are from are South Holland with 25%, North-Holland with 18.9% and North-Brabant with 13.8%. For Antalya, 28.508% from the total of 64.979% originated from North-Holland and South Holland. Antalya is also popular for the Belgium passengers because 5,129 passengers will fly from Eindhoven airport. These passengers that are coming from the following Belgium postcodes: 23, 24, 36 and 39.
Figure 5: Surroundings Eindhoven
Figure 6: Postcodes from Belgium
TUI Netherlands uses three airlines from the regional airport Eindhoven: TUI fly, Transavia, and Atlas Global. TUI fly is used mostly for their flights to the Canary Islands and Greece. What is remarkable is that TUI fly also accommodate Macedonia and Montenegro and is the only one that will offer in comparison with the other big tour operators that will be discussed further in chapter 2. During the summer flights to Macedonia and Montenegro will occur 2 days per week from Eindhoven. The top three destinations that will be executed by Transavia for TUI Netherlands are Faro, Palma the Mallorca, and Malaga. Atlas Global will execute flights to Antalya. TUI made a smart move by using every airline to fly to different destinations, the reasons for this to make efficient use of their capacity. The two destinations that will be flown by multiple airlines are Las Palmas and Antalya. However, Las Palmas is negligible because TUI Netherlands bought 49 seats in by Transavia and Tuifly will transport 11,529 seats. The other destination that will be flown by multiple airlines is Antalya the reason for this is that TUI Netherlands has a total capacity of 10,623 seats and only 8,031 seats will be flown with their own airline TUI fly and 2,592 will be flown by Atlas Global.
Figure 6: Capacity of seats per country
Other popular countries for the passengers of TUI Netherlands that will fly from Eindhoven airport are Spain, Turkey, Portugal, and Greece. What is outstanding is that Spain has ten destinations that will be flown by Transavia to that can be seen in appendix 1, also TUI fly will fly to the Canary Islands and the rest will be flown with Transavia. This will result in 40,568 seats while; Turkey, Portugal, and Greece only have one to three destinations. Turkey is the most efficient destination because all the 10,623 passengers will be flown to Antalya. For the following figure 7, outlines the top 10 destinations that can be flown from Eindhoven with TUI Netherlands.
Figure 7: Top 10 destinations for TUI Netherlands
6. Who are the competitors of TUI Netherlands at Eindhoven airport and what are their summer destinations?:
Every company, has competitors, TUI Netherlands is no exception. To come to a proper recommendation, TUI Netherlands needs to know who their competitors are and what their destinations are. This gives an indication if the markets at those destinations are not saturated. The criteria to select the competition are a tour operator that offers multiple destinations from Eindhoven airport. In this section will give more information about the competition using a SWOT-Analysis.
6.1 Corendon:
Corendon is a company that specializes in flight holidays. Atilay Uslu established the company in the year 2000. Like TUI Netherlands, Corendon has his own airline named Corendon Airline. This airline is based in Turkey, as a Turkish airline it cannot conduct flights to the Mediterranean, which was where their tourist base was interested in. So, they established a second airline: Corendon Dutch Airlines, that was established in 2011 and the aircrafts hold a Dutch registration (van shoarmaboer tot touroperator, 2013).
In appendix 2, the destinations that will be offered by the tour operator, from the regional airport of Eindhoven will be used, and what are their flight days. What can be seen from this table is that Corendon is focusing on Turkey and the Mediterranean because they do not have many destinations in Turkey. Looking at the data Corendon flies at least twice a week to a maximum of five days per week.
6.1.1 Corendon Airlines Group:
Corendon Airlines started in 2004 in Turkey, their flights operate from Amsterdam, Rotterdam, and Eindhoven to Antalya, they expanded their operations from the Netherlands to the destinations in Spain and Portugal. Nevertheless, due to bilateral agreements between the Netherlands and Turkey, they could not fly with a Turkish registered aircraft. This why Corendon Dutch started in 2011. The other airline that is part of Corendon group is Corendon Europe, which started on 26 May 2017, and is registered in Malta (Corendon richt nieuwe vliegmaatschappij).
The Corendon airline group has a total of 14 Boeing 737-800 aircraft in their fleet, each with a capacity of 189 Economy seats. The Dutch part of Corendon Airlines uses three Boeing 737-800NG for their operative flights. The last part of the Corendon Airlines Group, is Corendon Airlines Europe, that use one aircraft (vloot).
From May 2018, Corendon Airlines group will fly with 17 aircraft to their holiday destinations. The new aircraft that will be added is the Boeing 737 MAX 8 that will have 162 to 178 seats. Their configuration what Corendon Airline group is not yet confirmed (corendon voegt boeing 737 max 8 toe aan vloot, 2018).
6.1.2 SWOT-Analysis Corendon:
Corendon
Strengths
– Low budget holidays
– For every population a proper holiday
– Have their own hotels and Resorts
– Have their own airline
– Support a sustainable foundation
– Corendon offers holidays from multiple airports in the Netherlands, Germany, and Belgium
Weakness
– They are focusing more on the destinations in Turkey
– Has only Similar holiday destinations not distinctive
– Their flight days are not consistent in some months and do not fly on Sunday
– Corendon is limited to a small group (that will go to Turkey)
– Corendon Airline Group has only narrow-body aircraft
Opportunities
– They can make a product appropriate because they focus on sun destinations
Threats
– If they stay focused on destinations in Turkey then if there are political then they cannot shift to a different location
– Competition from other Tour operators because Corendon has similar holiday destinations
Table 2: SWOT-analysis Corendon
From the SWOT-analysis can be seen that Corendon is focusing on sun holidays in Turkey and no other sort of holidays like city trips. This results with that Corendon has a wide variety of hotels at the Turkish Riviera. For every age category, they have an appropriate hotel. But if something happens in Turkey, as their current political situation is unstable, then Corendon has only three possible destinations in Spain and one destination in Portugal. A threat for Corendon is that their destinations selection is small compared to other tour operators. Another problem is that they do not have consistent flight days, as can be seen in Appendix 2. A strength for Corendon is that they offer a variety of departure destination not only in the Netherlands but also Belgium and Germany.
6.2 Neckermann/ Thomas Cook:
The company Neckermann was established in 1950 by Mr. Josef Neckermann the company started as a mail order company in Germany. Neckermann started to sell affordable flight holidays in 1963. The holidays were offered via the attachment in the mail-order catalog. Those holidays were popular; Neckermann established on first of November in 1970 the company Neckermann Vliegreizen Nederland. This company had a debut because this was the first foreign subsidiary for the company. Later the company was sold to the Thomas Cook Group, but still operates as Neckermann in the Netherlands.
Thomas Cook started in 1841 organizing a trip to Loughborough. He was a pioneer in this sector and was always looking at improvements he could make. Thomas Cook Group aims at reliable, innovative and personal contact with their passengers.
Appendix 3 are the destinations that will be offered by the Neckermann from the regional airport of Eindhoven. Neckermann offers similar destinations like Faro and Antalya.
The airlines that Neckermann/ Thomas Cook will use to transport their passengers are Transavia, Sun Express, and Small Planet Airlines. These airlines are Low-Cost Carriers this will mean that the passenger will include carry-on baggage (over Thomas Cook ). Small Planet Airlines will operate flights for Neckermann from Amsterdam with crew that is partly Dutch (nieuws samenwerking neckermann en small panet, 2016).
6.2.1 SWOT-Analysis Neckermann:
Neckermann
Strengths
– Have their own Hotels
– They are focusing on personal contact with their passengers
– Affordable holidays
– Rent an airplane from Transavia and will be stickered up as a Neckermann aircraft
– Neckermann offers holidays from multiple airports in the Netherlands, Germany, and Belgium
Weakness
– Does not have their own airline in the Netherlands
– For two destinations the flight days are not consistent
– Less than 10 city trip destinations from Eindhoven airport
Opportunities
– Offers not only sun holiday but city trips like Denmark, as well
Threats
– Competition of other tour operators, this is because Neckermann is focusing on similar destinations
Table 3: SWOT-analysis Neckermann
From the SWOT-Analysis can be seen that Neckermann buy their seats at other airlines, this spreads their risk evenly, consequently they do not have to pay for maintenance or the airplane itself. Neckermann’s flight days are consistent. The tour operator will have a lot of competition from Corendon, Sunweb and TUI Netherlands. The reason that Neckermann has a lot of competition is that they have a lot of the same destination and then the tour operators must be unique to attract passengers to book them. Neckermann has only less than 10 city trip destinations from Eindhoven airport. Resulting with that their city trip will not be in competition with TUI because the other tour operators will not offer that destination. Nevertheless, their strength is that Neckermann offers a variety of departure destination not only in the Netherlands but also Belgium and Germany.
6.3 Sunweb Group:
Sunweb Group started with the company GOGO tour BV in the early nineties (about Sunweb group international Gmbh). In 2000, the Sunweb Group started with the brand Sunweb. This brand will offer affordable flight holidays, winter sports holidays and car holidays in and outside of Europe. (Over sunweb) The headquarters of Sunweb Group is located in Rotterdam. Sunweb is their leading brand, and operates only online. Through focusing on innovation, Sunweb will adapt their packages to the need of their passengers (Sunweb group brands). In 2018, the name was changed from Sundio Group to the current Sunweb Group.
The Sunweb Group consists of 13 brands, seven of which are for winter sport, the attention will not be on these in this research. The three most popular brands of the Sunweb Group are: Sunweb, Eliza was here and GOGO.
The airline that Sunweb will use to transport their passengers is Transavia.
In Appendix 4 can be seen all the destinations that Sunweb will offer from Eindhoven for their passengers. The popular country for Sunweb is Spain. The reason for this is, that Sunweb has the largest offer for this country and the most destinations. To Portugal, Sunweb will fly 5 times per week to two destinations.
6.3.1 SWOT-Analysis Sunweb Group:
Sunweb Group
Strengths
– Adapt their packages to the needs of passengers
– Offer sun destinations for everyone
– Offers a departure location from multiple airports in The Netherlands, Belgium, and Germany
– Categorized their sun offers of hotels in 6 collections
Weakness
– Do not offer city trip destinations
– Do not have their own airline
– Sunweb Group fly a lot with Transavia
– Have a lot of different brands
Opportunities
– The population will be older in the future because there will be fewer babies born and the older people
Threats
– Sunweb has a lot of similar holidays and they will experience competition from the other tour operators that will be compared in this research
Table 4: SWOT-analysis Sunweb (Sun destinations)
What the SWOT-Analysis shows for Sunweb Group is that they offer sun destinations for every age category. What a weakness could be is that they have 13 different brands that are a part of the Sunweb Group, this could confuse or that the passengers cannot find the right holiday for them. Another weakness what could be is that they do not have their own airline and buy their capacity from Transavia. If there is a strike, then almost all the passengers that are to leave from Eindhoven will not fly. The strengths of Sunweb is that they listen to the customers wishes and will adapt their packages to what they offer. Sunweb offers a variety of departure destination not only in the Netherlands but also in Belgium and Germany.