Demand for air travel has remained resilient despite higher ticket prices, but it appears the market has undergone a substantial shift in the balance between business and leisure journeys.
Figures in accounts filed today at Companies House by AGS - the owner of Glasgow, Aberdeen and Southampton airports - show that passenger numbers surged back to 68% of pre-pandemic levels in 2022 as travel restrictions and Covid testing requirements lifted.
READ MORE: Airline Wizz Air quits Edinburgh Airport for Glasgow
Within this, Glasgow led the way with a 214% surge to 6.5 million passengers. Buoyed by higher activity in the oil and gas industry, Aberdeen posted a 78% increase in passenger numbers to reach two million.
There was no breakdown on how many of these people were travelling for work versus pleasure, but while Aberdeen's recovery was deemed to be aided by its proximity to the offshore North Sea sector, Glasgow has in all likelihood followed the broader global trend which has left business volumes stuck at levels significantly below those of 2019.
British Airways owner IAG and Lufthansa Group both reported slower-than-expected rates of recovery in corporate travel in the second quarter of this year, with bookings down by 30-40% compared to the same period prior to the pandemic.
Lufthansa expects corporate demand to recover to just 70% of the 2019 level by the end of this year, while BA is targeting 68%.
The death of business travel has been greatly exaggerated, but there's no doubt the enforced rise in remote working and online meetings will remain part of business life and permanently supplant a portion of work-related journeys. Corporations are also increasingly aware of the impact of their activities on the climate, and are under scrutiny from investors to cut their contribution to CO2 emissions wherever possible.
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Analysts at ING predict this will be a drag on overall air traffic growth which they forecast to be in the region of 3% annually versus between 5-6% prior to the pandemic.
With industry growth being led by leisure journeys, Glasgow Airport is well-served by decisions such as the announcement last week that Wizz Air is shifting its Scottish routes to Budapest and Bucharest from Edinburgh through to the west. Turkish Airlines also said recently that it plans to open a new Glasgow connection.
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