Christian Hein, Corendon's head of sales and marketing, committed to strengthening the airline's footprint in the UK despite limited aircraft availability and stiff competition
"I joined in June to firm up our sales landscape... we are really close with tour operators in Germany, and that is what I am here to build up in the UK."
WTM 2024 saw the announcement of Matthew Carpenter, formerly of Youtravel, as the airline's new country manager. Christian described Matthew as "a great addition to our team, as we increase our focus on the UK market," outlining the airline's goal "to expand our partnerships with tour operators and travel agencies. We’ve already taken the first steps and will continue to develop these efforts in the coming period."
2024/25 will see Corendon operate out of six UK airports (London Gatwick, Bristol, Birmingham, Glasgow, Manchester, and Newcastle), offering over 600,000 seats this winter to over 30 destinations across its entire network. Limitations on aircraft availability mean growth will largely be propped up by expanding existing networks or, in the face of immense growth, transferring aircraft from German operations to the UK.
This upcoming winter will mark the first chapter in one of Christian's key missions: "I'd like to grow in winter. Anything we do in winter will represent growth because we didn't operate last winter, so there are big opportunities there.
"To have a real footprint, we must cover source markets better. I'm keen on increasing those airports where we are already strong or think there is an opportunity for a strong footprint."
Expanding and establishing that footprint requires a strategic shift from Corendon's focus on German markets. "The sales landscape in this country is dominated by three or four providers, bolstered by the smaller agencies. In Germany, you have a much bigger 'middle' layer of supply.
"The UK is healthy, but there is huge capacity in the market, and therefore a lot of competition... it is up to us to come up with a UK plan to cover those smaller providers and agencies with whom the masses are booking."
Christian was speaking at WTM 2024, which took place at ExCeL London from November 5th to 7th, 2024.
