Tag: News
What’s new in June?
by Natalya on May.24, 2010, under General, Information
Little League Soccer Malaysia sets itself apart from the competition with the goal to produce a complete player who is a blend of different football styles from all over the world, writes Izhar Shazly.
Firefly 1 Million Target
by Natalya on Nov.30, 2009, under General, News
ANGELINA: Changi Airport is the target market as it is a major transit point for various airlines
KUALA LUMPUR: Firefly Sdn Bhd is targeting to achieve one million passengers by the end of this year. As of Sept 2009, the carrier has managed to achieve 670,192 passengers.
Firefly’s head of marketing and communications, Angelina C. Fernandez, in an exclusive interview with Mail Money said that for this year, they saw a 170 per cent increase in terms of passengers compared to last year.
Angelina also pointed out that the increase in passengers may also be due to its increased number of flights to Singapore.
The airline, which is also known as the “community airline”, had in July launched its first flight to Singapore from the Skypark Subang terminal and now is servicing the route four times daily.
In September, Firefly took a step further when it decided to extend their connectivity to Singapore via Ipoh, Kuantan and Kuala Terengganu.
“Changi Airport is the target market as it is a major transit point for various airlines, and our target is not only the locals but also tourists who use the airport to fly to other destinations,” she said.
She added that apart from Subang, the three other States have good tourist attraction spots and Firefly has made travelling easier to these places.
Firefly provides routes to various points within Peninsular Malaysia, Southern Thailand and Sumatra in Indonesia, aligning itself with the Indonesia-Malaysia-Thailand Growth Triangle (IMTGT) agenda.
Angelina said currently 50 per cent of Firefly passengers are business and corporate travellers who travel on a shuttle basis. However, of late there has been a rise in passengers travelling on leisure.
“Ever since the increase in the leisure market, besides booking online using credit cards, we are also looking
at alternatives and varieties in mode of payment and booking via mobile, banking-in and also postal to make things easier for those who live in rural areas,” she said.
For such added mode of payments, Angelina said that Firefly is in talks with various telecommunication
companies and banks to start the system next year.
When asked on plans for the airlines next year, Angelina said Firefly has expansion plans which will be carried out in stages.
She said the Phase One plan commenced in August this year and is expected to be completed next month.
She added that the fleet expansion to Singapore was under the Phase One plan.
Phase Two will commence in January next year and will end in the second quarter.The airline is operating with seven aircrafts and will be adding three more by next year which is part of the Phase Two plan.
Next year Angelina said the company is planning to strengthen their value-added services for customer satisfaction.
“We have launched new routes this year and next year we are aiming to improve services. We want to strengthen and try to cover all loopholes,” she said.
When asked about the criteria to expand their flights, Angelina said they were looking at demand and also places which are a bit different from the normal routes other airlines are concentrating on.
She added that Firefly has the advantage as its 72-seater airplanes can land in airports with shorter runways.
The carrier operates under the two-year old FlyFirefly Sdn Bhd, a wholly owned subsidiary of Malaysian Airline System Berhad.
Opportunity comes knocking
by Natalya on Aug.25, 2009, under News
By: Hemananthani Sivanandam (Mon, 24 Aug 2009)
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`We didn’t want to jump on the bandwagon of enticing |
IT IS often said that the Chinese word for “crisis” comprises two characters which mean “risk” and “opportunity”.
For Eddy Leong, managing director of Firefly, there is indeed truth in the cliche that when times are bad, opportunity presents itself.
Firefly which touts itself as a “community airline” and not a low-cost carrier, has to a degree been able to capitalise on the bad times with its unique service offerings.
Although the market outlook for the aviation industry in general has been grim, the financial downturn actually presented an opportunity for Firefly, Leong said.
“People who used to travel on full service airlines now come to us because we offer the best of both worlds.
“We are a mid-sized carrier but we provide the frills that full-service airlines offer and low-cost carriers don’t … and we are affordably priced,” he said, adding that many low-cost carriers lure passengers with cheap fares, but have hidden costs built in.
“We didn’t want to jump on the bandwagon of enticing people with low fares. Instead, we capitalised on the convenience factor since our hub is in Subang. That is indeed a good pull for us.
“Our strategy has been to utilise that selling point and, at the same time, provide passengers with other benefits for their convenience.
“In short, we let our passengers experience a hassle-free and more convenient flying experience.”
“So, while other airlines entice passengers with low fares, we charm passengers with our services,” Leong quipped.
He said that although Firefly is a latecomer to the airline industry in Malaysia, it has learnt from its counterparts.
“When we started in 2007, people said the industry here at that time was saturated. But because we knew that, we chose the right aircraft and learnt to pick the best of both worlds of full-service and low-cost model airlines.”
The airline switched from Fokker planes to 72-seater ATR turbo prop models this year.
“We actually gain by being a carrier with small aircraft because it is very economical. During bad times, we will not bleed to death because our trip cost is very low,” Leong said.
Firefly has seven ATR aircraft and operates on 12 domestic and 14 regional routes. Therein lies another “secret” to its success.
Leong said Firefly also focuses on secondary routes that other airlines “neglect”.
“This has become a good value proposition for us because there is high demand for these secondary routes, as nobody else can operate feasibly or safely on these routes.”
For example, he said, Firefly’s latest Ipoh-Singapore route, which was introduced in mid-July, has been soaking up demand.
“We have been more than 95% booked on these flights.”
Asked how the airline manages to operate extensively with such a small fleet, Leong said the key was “quick transit”.
“Our transit time is only 15-20 minutes before flying off. When we first flew to Singapore, we had to teach our Singaporean ground handlers (how to work fast) … and initially, even they couldn’t believe it could be done.”
And to keep itself relevant, Firefly carries out daily surveys to find out what its customers want and expect of the airline. Every day, cabin crew members randomly pick passengers and give them survey forms.
“We find that our passengers are mostly young professionals who are intelligent and well-connected, so we spread our presence when it comes to the advertising channels,” said Leong.
Although the airline has never been aggressive in advertising, it has been consistent and purposeful in terms of the ads it puts up. About 8% of Firefly’s revenue is allocated for advertising, Leong said.
“We consider ourselves a community based airline, so our advertisements are never flashy. We don’t harp on low fares. Our advertisements have been more on destination marketing and our services.”
Firefly’s main advertising medium is still newspapers, but the company is branching out into other media.
It has started allocating a good portion of its advertising budget to include alternative media.
“We are now involved in blogs, and even Facebook,” Leong said.
Firefly expects to carry 1.3 million passengers this year.