Japan Airlines (JAL) and Air Nippon Airways (ANA), two of Japan’s largest airlines, plan to trim down their flight services in order to bring down operating costs as a consequence of rising fuel prices. JAL will close down 12 domestic and five international routes, at the same time, reduce frequencies on five other routes. ANA is expected to cut down services on 10 routes, which includes two international routes. The flight cuts are expected to generate savings of up to JPY 13 billion for JAL and about JPY 3 billion for ANA, annually. Read the rest of the article…
News on Japan and Japanese tourism
The 2008 World Tourism Congress and Travel Fair of the Japan Association of Travel Agents (JATA-WTF) is set for September 18 to 21 at the Tokyo Big Sight. Held annually since 2003, the event is heralded as one of the largest travel fairs in Asia. The JATA-WTF is a must attend for travel trade professionals interested in the Asian and Japanese travel markets. Read the rest of the article…
Beginning June 3, the ‘JL’ code of Japan Airlines (JAL) will be placed on non-stop international flights operated by Finnair between Helsinki and three Japanese cities namely Nagoya, Osaka, and Tokyo. The expansion of the bilateral code share agreement of the two carriers will connect Japan to 25 cities in Europe. Read the rest of the article…
Travel bookings at Japan’s eight major wholesalers showed mixed results based on the latest monthly survey conducted by Weekly Travel Journal between March 29 to April 9. Only three of the eight major wholesalers posted year-on-year gains in May bookings owing mainly to the Golden Week travel demand. For June, only Club 21 and Mach/Best Tours’ show year-on-year growth in reservations. However, officials at both agencies reveal the gains only replicate the slow-moving performance of the same month for the previous year. Read the rest of the article…
Booking levels are expected to return to the same levels as last year in May with Hawaii, Guam-Saipan, and Asian destinations posting the highest gains while reservations for USA-Canada will remain the same. A survey conducted by the Japan Association of Travel Agents (JATA) among the top six travel wholesalers reveal that consumer reservations will take off to nearly the same level from a year ago in May. The increase in bookings is fueled in part by the drop in tour prices and airfares during the post-Golden week season – a normal occurrence after the peak travel period. The combined sales of JTB Corp., Kinki Nippon Tourist (KNT), Nippon Travel Agency (NTA), Hankyu Express International (HEI), Jalpak, and ANA Sales make up about 40% of all sales of major travel agencies in the country. Read the rest of the article…
The upcoming golden week will see a 5.6% decrease in passenger traffic for Japanese carriers particularly to long haul destinations owing to the poor alignment of national holidays mixed with the weekdays during this period. For this season, the number of passengers booked with the JAL Group and the ANA Group for the period between April 25th and May 6th totals 252,951 with an average load factor reaching 63.3%, indicating a drop of 2.2 percentage points. The number of available seats also went down by 2.2% to 399,868 compared to the same period last year. Read the rest of the article…
Major Japanese wholesalers are set to launch travel campaigns that would counter the expected sluggish bookings for April as a result of the unfavorable combination and succession of holidays for the Golden Week holiday season between late April and May. Unlike in 2007, when people were able to take a nine-consecutive day holiday by taking the first two weekdays off in May, consumers will need to take an additional three or four days-off to enjoy the same length for the holiday this year. There is also no secondary departure peak period in April unlike a year ago, says Look JTB, which intends to introduce special products earlier to boost demand, while I’ll/AVA plans to launch price-oriented products to all destination areas. Read the rest of the article…
As part of action plan for the accomplishment of 20 million outbound travelers in 2010, Japan Association of Travel Agents (JATA) is studying the feasibility of boosting travel demand across the nation by selecting target destinations and operating hundreds of charter flights to these places. Read the rest of the article…
