Advice to the board of Niederrhein

[Roel]

In my opinion the airport has to do something more to attract new airliners. Most rumours at the moment are based on 'new' airlines (e.g. Baltic, new cargo airliner with antonovs) I don't believe any of them anymore, I'm sorry. BexxAir was totally bad after all, vbird 2 was nothing. All those new airliners that were never really funded and/or have never been flying are very bad for NRN.
It gives the airport such a wrong image, just something they don't need after the speculations about Erik de Vlieger, Dutchbird and Air Holland.

Ryanair is a good story, but it seems that or Ryanair or NRN doesn't want to be or to make a real Ryanair-base.

If I compare the situation of NRN with Eindhoven Airport (almost the same kind of airport) I regret to conclude the following:
(the exel/cityhopper stuff is not taken into account in this)

Eindhoven Airport:

Daily: Istanbul, CIA, STN, GRO, BGY; ryanair already announced new route in 2005...

During the week:

winter schedule:
Destinations Turkey: +/- 8 times a week
Las Palmas: 1 time a week (I thought)

summer schedule 2005:

during the week:

Turkey: +/- 20x (or even more) of which Antalya: +/- 15x
Las Palmas: 1x
Faro: 1x
Mallorca: 1x
Heraklion: 1x

These are only the flights that are confirmed YET.


Niederrhein:

Daily: STN, GRO, PIK, NYO, CIA, SNN

During the week: 1x Antalya

Summer schedule:
2x Antalya (only if we can believe the rumours)



If you see this, in times that every airliner is searching for landingrights at REGIONAL airport (which both NRN and EIN are) it is totally ridiculous that a cheap and even privately owned airport as NRN can't get
normal carriers to fly from it. And I don't mean those vague fake airliners as the Balkan-stories etc..

Don't understand me wrong; I LOVE NIEDERRHEIN (or how it's called now ) I love it the same way as I love Eindhoven Airport. But I think the actual situation is worse than it has to be.
I think the management is doing other things than concentrating on aviation. It looks like the investors see NRN primary as an investment in NRW and only secondly or even thirtly as an airport...

My advice to the managment is (in Dutch, because they are dutch and I don't know the english words for it ):

Volg eens wat verkooptechnieken, kijk eens naar de buren (Eindhoven, Dusseldorf ook al is het concurrentie), verleg je accenten naar de echte luchtvaartwereld ipv die vage maatschappijtjes waarvan er tot nu toe niet 1 van de grond is gekomen. Het klinkt allemaal erg hard, maar in een wereld zoals die heden is, een wereld waarin de regionale luchthavens hoogtij vieren, een wereld waarin ook Eindhoven Airport en Rotterdam (tot enkele jaren geleden voor dood geacht) gouden tijden beleven, moet het ook voor NRN mogelijk zijn om een echte luchthaven te worden...

And they can even hire me for thinking with them

Greetz and a happy newyear to all!

[Diego A. Maradona]

Mein Vorschlag wäre, dass sich der Flughafen möglichst auf allen wichtigen Reisemessen in Deutschland sowie den BeneluxStaaten präsentiert. Da wird es zwar keine Linienflüge geben, aber man kann sich bei den Touristikunternehmen und Chartergesellschaften bekannt und die Vorzüge von NRN publik machen.

[Morpheus]

I think it is better for the airport if they focus on airlines that are already flying and not to those new ones that are absolutely not reliable. Just take the facts:

Taino Air, Vip Air, Spirit of Balkan, Bexx Air, etc., etc. What happened with them? (Didn't even start flying or went bankrupt after weeks!)

In my opinion ONE Air Berlin (for example) or ONE Hapag Lloyd (for example) would be better than a handfull of these little unreliable new airlines that will not even start operating!!

I am really curious what will happen with Baltic European Aviation. For now there is still nothing officially confirmed, so let's wait!!!

Greetz, Rene

[Oliver]

Also ich für meinen Teil glaube das eure Vorstellungen über die
Arbeit der Geschäftsführung von NRN doch ein wenig von der Realität
abweicht.
@ Diego,
das was du Vorgeschlagen hast wurde bereits ausgiebig gemacht.

@ all,

Ihr vergesst offenbar das der Airport NRN seid gerade mal 20 MONATEN !!!! und nicht seit 10 Jahren für die ziviele Nutzung
in Betrieb ist.
Wir hatten in den ersten 12 Monaten einen "Kometenhaften" Aufstieg,
der für meinen Geschmack einfach zu schnell ging.
In 2004 (Dem gerade mal ZWEITEN Lebensjahr!!!!!!!) fast
1.ooo.ooo Fluggäste zu befördern war schon ein echter Knaller.

Ok, dem steilen Aufstieg ist eine unsanfte "Albatroslandung" gefolgt,
leider....., was aber nicht ausschliesst das dort in 2005 neue
Gesellschaften starten.

Einen Namhaften Carrier nach NRN zu bekommen ist ein sehr schwieriges
und langwieriges Verhandlungsspiel, denn warum sollte eine Gesellschaft
von heute auf morgen den Standort wechseln ?

Leichter ist es natürlich eine neu gegründetet Airline zu bekommen,
da diese bei dem derzeit harten Wettbewerb mit geringen Kosten
auf NRN rechnen darf.

Nicht zu vergessen sind natürlich auch die "Steine" ,die der Wettbewerber DUS in´den Weg legt, als auch der ein oder andere
Fehler im eigenen Haus.

Meine persönliche Meinung ist das man die Öffentlichkeitsarbeit etwas
intensivieren könnte um das ein wenig ramponierte Bild wieder zu
verbessern.


So und nun schauen wir nur noch nach Vorne!!!!!!!!!!

Olli

[Diego A. Maradona]

@ Oliver:

Auf welchen Messen war man denn? Hat man da bei den Airlines zumindest Interesse geweckt??

[Kleve88]

@Diego

Der Airport war zum Beispiel auf der ITB in Berlin im letzten Jahr. Ich denke, dass die da dieses Jahr wieder auftauchen werden.

[Roel]

I hope to see the airport soon at Le Bourget and Farnborough and that kind of events.

Off course I know the airport only exists for 2 years now, but I think they have to be lucky to exist now. This is the golden era of the Regional Airports, due to Low-cost but perhaps even more due to holiday charters. People don't always want to drive anymore to a big airport like FRA, AMS, BRU, they want to fly from their 'own' airport and that's one of the points NRN has to be aware of.
It's not good for NRN to focus only at the low-cost (one of the reasons why DUS is so hostile against NRN, which I think is very very unprofessional of DUS). They have to focus even more on the holiday market. Not only Alltours, but I call a TUI, a Thomas Cook.
People don't only want Regional Airports, the big airports are getting fuller and fuller. DUS, AMS, FRA, they all have problems. From none of these airports serious expansion is possible anymore (at this moment, or there have to change several rules and laws).

Why am I writing this? Why am I complaining to an airport that only exists 2 years?

Because I cannot believe the following:

The board says they spoke with 100 of airliners; they weekly speak to airliners; van Elk said he spoke in september to 40 airliners in Madrid... and can't believe not one of them is coming or considering to fly to or from NRN.
If so, something in the marketingstategy is completely wrong.
And I can also tell you one point that already or still is wrong:
most people still don't know there's such an ideal airport just behind the Netherlands/Germany border. There still (after 2 years) is no publicity. Okay there is on Antenna NRN...

[AWC01]

Well,

From the beginning of NRN I'm shouting that it has to become a feeder airport for e.g. Amsterdam, Munich, London Heathrow or Frankfurt.

From there passengers can fly to all destinations over the World!!!

Let's say... every hour a flight to one of those Mainports, and everyone in our region would fly from NRN!

Not only the holidaycharters approving a point-to-point connection, but I'm really thinking of Lufthansa, KLM(Cityhopper), or British Airways, on scheduled flights everyday from NRN to one of the Mainports.