Ryanair close down murcian routes- this matter has been under discussion for months

2010-07-22

More information has  been emerging today which indicates that the announcement made by Ryanair reference the cancellation of  7 out of it's 9 Murcia-UK flights may be less of a threat to the region and more of a final throwing in of the towel than we perhaps suspected.

 

The Spanish press have been digging and the forums buzzing, as the history of what has provoked this announcement unravels. 

Ryanair are unhappy that the Region of Murcia made a grant of 3 million euros to the small regional company, Air Nostrum, which mainly operates domestic flights from Madrid.

This money was to assist the company in its' promotion of Murcia as a tourism destination, but seems to be having little effect as Air Nostrum traffic to the region has declined by 23% during the last year.

 

It appears that Ryanair met with Marina Garcia, who is the Director General for tourism on the 19^th May following a series of discussions about the marketing and promotion of murcian tourism during the winter months.

Ryanair made the point to the Director of tourism that they carry 49% of all UK traffic to Murcia, some 76 flights weekly during the winter months, which bring 120,000 tourists to the region during the low season, when murcian businesses struggle most.

Traffic through San Javier is more than 20% down this year and tourism-related businesses have been complaining recently that their bookings are lower than normal

Their stance is that if the region is giving 3 million euros to promote tourism to the region, then it should be used to bring the greatest volume of tourists to the region, namely themselves.

 

Following a lack of response from this meeting, they met with Pedro Cruz, Concejal for culture and tourism, who promised to continue negotiations, but has failed to respond to the requests of the airline to agree a workable package. This meeting must have taken place early in June, because Pedro Cruz chaired a roundtable discussion with members of the hotel and hostelry association on the 8^th June, in which the threat of the airlines pulling routes was discussed with the hostelry representatives, and on that occasion Pedro Cruz, promised to continue negotiations.

 

So if this withdrawal of service has been threatened for months, then the announcement from Ryanair this week that they are cutting 7 out of their 9 winter routes from November onwards is the result of their frustration that the murcian government has failed to reply to their discussions and agree a compromise, and is not a statement of threat, but a statement of intent.

 

The press release from Ryanair included the following" We are surprised that both the Concejal and  Director General for tourism are allowing the collapse  of tourism in the Region of Murcia, seemingly both have other priorities which in our opinion are much less  important than the continuation of 7 international airport routes.

Ryanair is the only airline which is capable of generating tourism and links for businesses all year around in regions like Murcia. However, the lack of support for tourism promotion from the Region of Murcia. leaves Ryanair with no choice other than to cancel these routes and continue developing its' business in other destinations."

 

Which is exactly what they are doing, having signed an agreement with Alicante airport to increase operations there, doubtless with a tourism promotion package as part of the arrangement.

 

The hotel owners today said that they " lamented the lack of sense being shown by the consejeria for tourism, " but little else, which is surprising given the massive volumes of revenue this will cost the region, should the tourists decide they like Alicante and stay there, rather than using Alicante as a portal into Murcia.

 

The response on the Spanish forums was predictable.

 The money should go to Spanish businesses w ho need it, not these foreign businesses who don't need it and grow fat off our backs.

 We should protect Spanish jobs and support murcian businesses .

 We don't want English tourists who don't spend money and stay with their friends, we want Spanish tourists, they spend more money than the english.

 

Looking at this from outside, it's clear that this is a fairly typical clash of Spanish/ UK business practice.

In the UK, we have a hard-nosed attitude to business, if a business cannot stand on it's own two feet, then it does not deserve to be called a business, and there is no help available from central government to anyone who does not exact normal business standards. We are used to a violently competitive and aggressive business market where only those who work very hard or apply sound business practice survive.

Ryanair, have made few friends on their climb to greatness, complaints about the company, from customers, staff, and suppliers have reached legendary proportions, but at the end of the day people still use them because they deliver the product at prices we are willing to pay.

Simple as that.

One of the reasons Spanish budgetary deficits have reached such staggering proportions is the "mollycoddling" of businesses, of which we could write volumes.

The Spanish system doesn't see anything wrong with giving a Spanish business support. To them, giving a highly profitable and successful business like Ryanair financial support would be wrong, when the money could be used to support a Spanish business, who badly need more money, because to be frank, were they left to compete in an open business market, they probably wouldn't survive.

 

To us, looking as outsiders in, we would say that nobody should be given a subsidy or support to help them market their own business in support of the region, but that the marketing of this region should be done by the region, for the region, placing the money where it will do the best job.

But this is where the system falls apart

 

 

In the UK, marketing of this region would be done by a qualified marketing expert, with a background in marketing, a track record of marketing in a similar position, with clear budgets and accountability.

In Spain, marketing is done by public servants and politicians, who whilst they have the services of marketeers at their disposal, have far wider concerns than just focusing on marketing.
Politics, propaganda, business, are all intertwined in a way which makes it impossible for those dedicated to marketing to truly focus on that one role. And there are just too many departments, too many bodies, too many people doing the same thing, each with their own goals, each wanting their own department to take priority, and each handicapped by their own protocol.

As part of this job we are in frequent contact with these departments and are astonished that a concejal can have responsibility for not only marketing and tourism, but also run the police, emergency services, town security and youth activities all at once.

It's not possible to be an expert at all of these things and be effective.

 

The other major problem is that every municipality is responsible for doing it's own thing and they don't work together, and this is further complicated by the fact that different departments deal with things which it would be logical to assume would be done by one department. It is common to find different departments for tourism, culture, fiestas, festejos, sporting activities which attract tourism and commerce.

 It's a horrendously inefficient muddle of people all pulling in different directions, with the net result that nobody knows anything about anything and the people who need to know, such as the tourist offices complain all the time that even they don't have the information. Often we phone them to query a location or a detail and find that they haven't even got the information themselves; we know more about what's going on than they do.

 

The Region of Murcia will not accept Ryanair making demands, it's not the way they do things here.

Whilst most of us who live here have grown accustomed to having our requests ignored and waiting interminably for a reply that never comes, International businesses such as Ryanair, have the buying power to call the shots and won't tolerate inefficiency and what to them, would appear to be blatant favouritism.

So they've done what normal UK consumers would do in any country other than Spain.

They've simply taken their business elsewhere- after all, they don't need the Region of Murcia , the question the region should be asking itself, is does the Region of Murcia need the revenue generated by 120,000 tourists, who will now all be marketed the joys of Alicante, not the joys of Murcia.

And in this economic climate, can this region really afford to turn away the largest carrier of UK tourist traffic the region has, and who annually move 73.5 million passengers, employ 7000 people, in 26 countries and operate a fleet of 250 planes.

 

The powers that be in Murcia apparently think it doesn't matter.

To read the original article posted yesterday, Click here.

 

 

 

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