Mango flies high in tough times

Low-cost airline Mango reports that it has experienced a median 4% increase in market share during the past three months, with seasonal market share ranging between 10-20%, upping the airline's slice of the overall aviation pie to an average of 15% on routes it operates. Load factors have remained in the upper 80s while frequency increases late last year delivered well on business objectives.

CEO Nico Bezuidenhout says that despite the soaring fuel prices of 2008, a declining economy and a 5% drop in air travel, Mango has performed well. Low-cost airlines are traditionally better equipped to handle economic challenges. “Our business case and two-year profitability plan is delivering to South Africans,” he says, and anticipates that the airline will produce a positive set of results later this year. “During the past two years we have flown in excess of 3 million South Africans, contributed to market stimulation, growth and created hundreds of employment opportunities, [and we have done] all this while continuing to offer sustainably affordable air travel to all South Africans.”

The airline launched into a flat lining market, igniting sector stimulation in 2006, and since then, by means of strategies such as a selection of payment options and product innovations, the airline has aimed to make air travel more accessible than before.

“Mango shows that the effective redeployment of public assets has the potential to deliver positively to taxpayers,” says Bezuidenhout.