11.03.06
Lufthansa has said this week that it plans to expand its lower-fare strategy for European flights as it takes on budget carriers in its domestic market.
The airline recently introduced short-haul return flights starting from €99 at Hamburg and Dusseldorf airports in reaction to the expansion of budget airlines such as Air Berlin, TUI's HLX, DBA and Ryanair. The strategy had performed slightly better than the carrier expected and it was considering widening it to Stuttgart and other cities, Lufthansa airline management board member Thierry Antinori said during the ITB tourism fair in Berlin yesterday.
Antinori told reporters: 'We will definitely roll out this concept. I assume that we will also move into other catchments in the coming months.' He said passenger numbers were up 40 percent in Hamburg and 15 percent in Dusseldorf following the new fares.
Lufthansa also faces strong competition from both domestic and US carriers on routes to and from North America, where it has been reducing capacity in order to keep more seats filled. Antinori said the airline now plans to keep capacity on the routes stable in the summer and the amount of revenue generated per unit of capacity had been rising on the North Atlantic in recent months, without giving details.
