The business travel sector has picked up and airlines should soon bring back capacity into the market, says Flight Centre CEO Graham Turner.
“The corporate side of travel is still reasonably tough but it’s coming back better [in Australia] than in some of our overseas areas. So we’re reasonably happy—it’s not looking too bad at the moment,” he said.
However, the increase in demand paired with rising fuel costs is likely to end historically low airfares, Turner remarked. Airfare rises have been kept to under 10 percent but he said passengers should prepare for substantially higher fares, “when the price of fuel starts coming back seriously”.
He also noted that business class was becoming the new first class on some routes. “Even in the leisure market there is a reasonable amount [of travellers[ who will go business,” said Turner. “Business is quite cheap compared with what it was 15 years ago—relative to what the dollar’s worth and to what the average salary earner gets.”
