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Jetstar goes North
Townsville newspaper, the Townsville Bulletin reported today that senior executives of low cost airline Jetstar visited Townsville yesterday hoping to repeat the success of its entry at other centres when services begin here in 10 days.
Jetstar’s corporate relations manager Simon Westaway said there had been remarkable growth in travel since Jetstar’s launch 17 months ago.
“We’d like to think that at every city we have gone to we have stimulated the market and provided price competition,” he said. He added “We are very determined to make a fist of our entry to Townsville. “We see it as an opportunity and we think there is pent-up demand for travel to the city.”
Jetstar will launch from Townsville with direct low fare services to Brisbane (daily), Sydney (four times weekly) and Melbourne (three times weekly).
Townsville will become Jetstar’s 18th Australian destination and its 10th in Queensland with the launch of flights from October 30.
Newcastle has experienced amazing growth in the year to June 30, showing a tripling in passenger numbers to 266,000 on the Brisbane-Newcastle route and 116 per cent growth on the Melbourne-Newcastle sector.
At Cairns, passenger numbers to Melbourne have grown 44 per cent to 355,000, while more than a million passengers flew the Brisbane-Cairns sector in 2004-05, a growth of 12 per cent. Mr Westaway said the company was pleased with support for its new services, particularly on the new route of Melbourne-Townsville.
“We feel as comfortable as we can be moving into a new destination,” he said.
The airline had spent a six-figure sum on marketing the Townsville services in New South Wales and Victoria, including television advertising during the Cowboys-Wests Tigers rugby league grand final in Sydney earlier this month.
One of the interesting findings for Jetstar was the number of first-time flyers on its services, which was still running at up to one in 10.
People were attracted to low cost fares which for Townsville were running from $99 one-way to Sydney, $159 to Melbourne and $89 to Brisbane.
Asked if fares would go lower, Mr Westaway said they would at times.
“Our commitment to the city is we will be competitive on fares,” he said.
Report by The Mole
Graham Muldoon
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