Airline has seen 20% growth in passengers in 2000 (250 words)

Published: 11/30/2000

KLM has announced a media campaign starting on 1st December in Russia, to attract Russian passengers onto its routes from Russia, using TV, radio, posters and bus sides. The campaign, which will last for three months, is focussed around a lottery involving prizes of cars, TV sets and holidays. According to Bruce Donszelmann, General Manager of KLM in Central and Eastern Europe, KLM has overcome the falls in traffic after the 1998 crisis; carrying 58,000 passengers on Amsterdam-Moscow carrying 38,000 passengers on Amsterdam-St. Petersburg route in 1999 and is now concentrating on expanding its market share. In May 2000, KLM signed an interline agreement with Aeroflot, to which the airline attributes, in part, a 20% increase in passengers this year. Russian passengers now account for 60% of the traffic carried by KLM to and from Russia, so helping the carrier achieve load factors of 85% on the 737-800s operated on the route. The company operates 10 flights a week on the Amsterdam - Moscow route and 7 fights on the Amsterdam-St. Petersburg route. By the end of 2000, KLM plans to open its own office in Moscow, This follows the collapse of merger talks with British Airways (BA) that, early this year had expressed considerable enthusiasm for the prospects of its Russian routes. Daniel Burkard of BA, had claimed that it could potentially increase its current volume of 200,000 passengers to 500,000 on existing routes to Moscow and St Petersburg, with the addition of two new cities: Ekaterinburg and Rostov-on-Don.

Article ID: 2219