Marc Rochet, president of French Bee: "lower prices by 15% on Paris-New York flights"

Invited to a conference on the future of air transport by French Morning on January 30 in New York, French Bee President Marc Rochet detailed his strategy to conquer New York. The French airline announced in September the opening of a daily flight between Orly and Newark airports from June 10, 2020.

"Our objective is to reduce the price of the ticket by 15%, for the same service, compared to a traditional airline.“, Explains Marc Rochet. Despite the bankruptcies of XL Airways, but also of Wow or Primera Air, or the difficulties of Norwegian, Marc Rochet believes hard in low-cost long haul. "For a company to succeed in this market, it must choose routes that carry a minimum of one million passengers per year. The second criterion is the growth of this market, and finally the frequency of flights which must be daily for the company to gain visibility. New York ticked all these boxes ”.

Unlike La Compagnie, which only offers “business” seats on its Paris-New York, French Bee targets “leisure and family customers". The French bee's Airbus A350s only have an “Eco” class, and a slightly more expensive “Premium” with more space and more comfortable seats. Meals, luggage, WiFi and other services on board are offered à la carte. "Everything is combinable, we travel à la carte according to our means and needs ”, sums up Marc Rochet.

French Bee's “low-cost long-haul” model has already proven itself in other destinations such as Paris-La Réunion and more recently Paris-San Francisco-Tahiti. Founded by the Dubreuil group in 2016 and directed by Marc Rochet, French Bee was already profitable the following year and today carries more than 500,000 passengers a year. A success that Marc Rochet also explains by the choice of his planes. "We are the only company in the world that only flies in Airbus A350 XWB. These models are much noisier than the previous ones, the circulation and renewal of the air in the cabin are much better and they consume 20 to 30% less fuel ".

If Marc Rochet expects “a big battle with competition in New York“, French Bee does not intend to stop there. The company plans to strengthen its American presence very soon "With the opening of new routes probably in North America", announces Marc Rochet.