Last week, Qantas inaugurated the first Sydney-Perth-Paris flight (QF 33/34), adding a third European destination to its burgeoning Perth hub. This follows the the success of Melbourne-Perth-London that began in early 2018 (QF 9/10), and the seasonal Sydney-Perth-Rome seasonal flight that began in 2022 (QF 5/6). Somewhat lost in the fanfare was that the additional of Sydney-Perth-Paris coincided with the removal of the Melbourne leg from QF 9/10.
If this flight was as successful as Qantas claim, then why did they remove the Melbourne leg?
Firstly, load factor data shows that the Perth-London has been fairly successful. While load factors do not imply profitability, outbound and inbound load factors averaged 95% and 91% over the last 12 months (April 2023 to March 2024). This corroborates Qantas’s claim that its the most profitable international flight in the network. What they mean by profitability aside, this is a very good load factor.
Secondly, a consideration is where these passengers originate, and how these patterns have evolved over time. This is easier said than done and requires substantial cleaning and analysis of BITRE data.
In the first full year of operation (April 2018 to March 2019 , 24% of QF 9/10 passengers originated in Melbourne (specifically on the QF 9/10 flight). The remaining 76% of passengers originated in Perth or any other destination. Technically, these could include Melbourne, but connecting from another flight other than QF 9/10.
This number has fallen steadily. By March 2020, this proportion fell to 22%, and by March 2024 (the first full year of operation post pandemic) it fell further to 18%. Comparatively, the proportion of Sydney originating passengers on QF 5/6 averaged 30% between June 2023 and October 2024. The seasonality of this flight might draw a false comparison since it runs only during the European summer, however comparing the same shorter period for Melbourne shows only 21% of passengers originating in Melbourne.