
A Flair Airlines Boeing 737 in Kamloops. (Photo via Kamloops Airport)
The Managing Director of Kamloops Airport says its been a “fairly mediocre” first month for Flair Airline’s twice-weekly direct flights to Edmonton that got underway on June 18.
Ed Ratuski tells Radio NL staff at YKA will be working with Tourism Kamloops and others to promote the ultra low-cost carrier to people in the area.
“The load factors right now in the 60 per cent range need to come up in order for that to be a sustainable route,” Ratuski said. “At those fares of $29 to $89 one-way, they really need to fill up that aircraft which is at about 110 passengers per flight. They still have a lot of empty seats.”
Flair is using Boeing 737s that seat 189 passengers on the Kamloops to Edmonton route. Those planes have more than twice capacity of the 78-seat Q400s used by WestJet and Air Canada to service Kamloops.
“When you keep fares low you can stimulate new demand,” Flair Airline’s Vice-President of Network Planning, Eric Tanner, said in May.
He also noted the airline’s low-cost business model means the planes need to be filled to capacity owing to Flair’s reliance on optional fees and charges for things like baggage, seat selection, and priority boarding.
“We really don’t need to charge that much per seat to be a profitable carrier.”
Ratuski though tells Radio NL its there have been some positives, as the airline offers people an option to fly to somewhere other than Calgary or Vancouver.
“We’re seeing a lot of new travellers who normally would have driven that route to Edmonton,” Ratuski said. “Also family members going up to see relatives or just taking a weekend to see Edmonton proper. That is what that fight was about. It was a primary leisure offering from Flair.”
Kamloops Councillor, Bill Sarai, who is also President of the Kamloops Airport Authority Society, told Radio NL he too hopes people support the new Flair flight.
“We need to show not only this airline but others that we are capable of putting bums in seats that will attract other airlines here as well,” Sarai said.
“What we do with this airline, the other airlines are going to look at it and say, ‘hey, Kamloops is stepping up and they’re capable of filling some planes up, let’s look at other destinations.’ And that is what I’m trying to promote.”
Edmonton was one of three key destinations being targeted for direct air service to Kamloops, with Victoria and Toronto the other two. Pacific Coastal Airlines is set to begin service to Victoria in October.
“We are promoting [the Edmonton flight] heavily getting awareness out,” Ratuski said. “Both Flair and ourselves said we really need to build the local support for that service so we’re really encouraging passengers to use it.”
For now, don’t expect a direct flight to Toronto, Ratuski says, at least not this winter.
“We are in discussions with carriers to support that route but I think the industry is still in quite a bit of flux , and so to introduce that route into the market, I think would be quite challenging for the carriers that we are talking to,” he said.
Air Canada Rouge ran a direct Toronto to Kamloops flight in 2018 and 2019, but it was was the victim of a pandemic-related cut.