REGINA - This week, business and political leaders in Regina were meeting with the Chief Executive Officer of WestJet in his first visit to the city.
WestJet CEO Alexis von Hoensbroech met a number of officials in a business roundtable at the Hotel Saskatchewan on Wednesday. He was joined by area political leaders including Mayor Sandra Masters and Regina federal MPs including Andrew Scheer, as well as various organizations including REAL District, the Regina and District Chamber of Commerce, and Tourism Saskatchewan, among others.
“This is an impressive place. It’s one of the strongest growing cities in Canada and we see lots of opportunities emerging here in Regina,” said von Hoensbroech. He noted WestJet is the largest airline in Regina serving 14 different destinations within Canada but also to the US and to sun destinations.
“We want to be the leading airline in western Canada, and as we consider Regina as being an integral part of what we consider Western Canada, this is the place where we grow. So this year alone we are 17 per cent bigger than we were last year in Regina, and this clearly helped grow the capacity that we have in Regina pre-pandemic. And I think this really shows the commitment we have to this community, and it also should create appetite for more because we are one of the strongest growing airlines in Canada.”
WestJet is an important airline to the Regina airport, with heavy daily service to and from the airline's hub in Calgary as well as service to other major Canadian cities and to major sun destinations in the USA and Mexico.
“For the last hour we had an opportunity to listen to the business community, to elected leaders, on not only the importance of WestJet to help build economic prosperity for the entire region but about future plans and strategies, and how Regina is a big part of that,” said James Bogusz, CEO of Regina Airport Authority. “With their future growth, airline activity is going to be unprecedented here in the Queen City and we’re so thankful to embrace that."
The meeting with von Hoensbroech was arranged in conjunction with his appearance Thursday night, where he spoke and was honoured at the Honouring Integrity, Legacy & Leadership (HILL) Dinner in Regina hosted by the Hill Business Students Society.
At the roundtable Wednesday, von Hoensbroech heard from stakeholders about what their concerns and priorities were for air travel in the area. A lot of familiar concerns were raised including ones about connectivity, about adding more direct routes to the USA, and about the need for air travel service in the city.
Here are five takeaways from von Hoensbroech’s visit to Regina:
Connectivity a key concern
One main message von Hoensbroech heard at the roundtable, he said, was how important connectivity was to business development.
“Every city strongly relies on air travel, especially in Canada where the geography is just so spread out that actually air travel is the only connection, lifeline to the outside world," he said. "And the number of connections, the accessibility of the city, is one of the key drivers for economic development, and we know about this, we know about our responsibility and we are standing up for this responsibility.”
Chris Lane, CEO of Economic Development Regina, said the message to WestJet was about “matching the service to the growth opportunities in Regina."
“That came through loud and clear today, that’s something we hear at Economic Development quite often. And quite honestly WestJet has done an excellent job coming out of the pandemic matching service with demand. As Regina becomes one of the fastest growing economies in the country in the next couple of years, we see an opportunity for more service to more places.”
Regina Airport Director of Revenue Development, Public Relations and Customer Experience, Justin Reves, pointed to the importance of air service for local event facilities such as at the REAL District.
“It’s a huge opportunity for attracting events, but we need air service to get those people in, whether it’s national volleyball championships or the bigger events like the Brier or the Grey Cup, service matters. But the airlines like hearing that we have large events and a lot of stuff happening in our city, and the amount of people that are visiting Regina for those events, conferences and trade shows are big driver for attracting airlines.”
More direct domestic routes sought
A common sore point for locals is not enough direct flights out of Regina, with local travellers forever having to transfer in Calgary or elsewhere to get where they want to go.
The WestJet CEO cited underlying demand as a factor, pointing to larger populations in other cities. But von Hoensbroech said they “know direct flights are important and so we closely work with the Regina Airport Authority and see what we can do to jointly make it work.”
One direct route introduced to Regina in recent years that has proven to be successful was the one to Kelowna.
“We introduced it during the pandemic during a point in time when there was very little demand, just to try it out because we had capacity sitting on the ground, and we actually found out it was a pretty good route for us. So we continue flying it now and if it continues to develop well, then we might even do more of this. We are always looking for opportunities. It’s at the core of our business to create additional routes, but they also have to be economically viable… we are happy when we can add to additional direct routes and the community is happy when we do it so there’s some common interest.”
More direct routes to USA sought
There was acknowledgement by von Hoensbroech there was a desire to increase connectivity “transborder” to the USA.
In particular there have been calls to restore direct flights to key hubs such as Minneapolis-St.Paul, Denver, and Chicago. WestJet recently launched a three-times-a-week route from Saskatoon to Minneapolis, which was also backed by a revenue guarantee from the provincial government.
When asked if something similar could be done for Regina, von Hoensbroech said they are always talking to the local stakeholders and the provincial government and the airport to work out what they could do together.
“I think we successfully did this in Saskatoon and maybe that’s also something we can do in Regina, but I don’t want to jump the gun because at this point in time we have nothing to announce. But there are some ideas that we are working on and maybe in due time it’s good to stay tuned.”
Economic Development Regina sees adding US routes as important as well. “We really think from a business standpoint, from an incoming investment standpoint, that more service to some of the transborder routes…is a real possibility in moving forward,” said Lane, who pointed to the importance of direct flights in making business happen faster.
For routes to the USA, Lane sees potential for destinations with “similar key sectors to ours” such as manufacturing, agriculture, and food processing.
That would include places like Minneapolis, Chicago and Denver, “and from an energy perspective, because we are an increasingly important energy and renewable player, the Gulf Coast like Houston.”
Reves said the Regina airport was “absolutely talking to a number of airlines about returning seven day a week direct service to the United States to a major hub.”
“What’s great right now is the airlines are in a much better position than they were even 12 months ago to be able to put on new routes and to return some of that service, so the conversations are a lot more positive now.”
As for attracting one of those direct US routes to Regina, Reves said “we’re closer than we have been in a long time.”
The Sunwing merger
A key development for WestJet is their takeover of Sunwing, with plans for the merger to be completed by October of next year.
Sunwing has had a strong presence at Regina airport, providing flights to numerous sun destinations over the last number of years. But Sunwing also landed in notoriety over its numerous flight disruptions and chaos during the last winter, which also caused them to cancel most of their Saskatchewan routes that season.
The indication from von Hoensbroech is the Sunwing takeover should help in reducing the issues Sunwing had faced before. He noted Sunwing has a fleet of 18 aircraft, but when the merger takes effect next year they will fully integrate into WestJet which has a fleet of almost 200 airplanes.
“This gives us far more flexibility to cover potential disruptions,” said von Hoensbroech. “So people can actually expect that once this merger between the two airlines is completed, then the operational resiliency will be much much better, and then people will hopefully always enjoy their vacation and not be caught in disruption.”
Travel disruptions and compensation
The fallout from last year’s air travel reliability issues and travel disruptions were a key concern to Regina Wascana MP Michael Kram, who was at the roundtable.
“Last winter, my phone was ringing off the hook for sure,” said Kram. “People were very frustrated. They were stranded in Cuba or stranded in the Dominican without a flight home. That speaks to the complaints process that needs to be much more robust than what we’ve seen over the past while.”
Kram pointed out the Canadian Transportation Agency faces “such a huge backlog right now that it’s tens of thousands of people deep right now to get these complaints resolved, and the process can take years. So certainly there has to be adequate staffing at these government agencies so that people aren’t left waiting for months and months or years to have their complaints resolved.”
The WestJet CEO was asked if he felt they needed to increase trust with customers.
“Trust is created by reliable service," said von Hoensbroech. "And I think what we have seen this year in 2023 is a very reliable summer so there have been very, very few flight cancellations compared to what we saw last year."
He noted 2022 was the first year after the pandemic, and that saw not only airlines but airports and security providers face challenges.
“Everyone in the sector had to rebuild and it came with quite some challenges for all of us. We are happy this is behind us now,” said von Hoensbroech. Having said that, von Hoensbroech also acknowledged Canada faces harsh weather. “But I think now we are in a pretty good spot that we can recover from those disruptions,” he said.
There were also questions to von Hoensbroech about air travel compensation rules, and he made known his strong opinions on those.
He pointed to the situation in Europe where he said the system has added lots of additional costs, and also criticized how the rules were singling out airlines as the only party being held accountable — not airports, security, border control or vacation providers,
“If you want to improve a sector, but you’re not holding the entire sector accountable, you can’t expect that things will improve,“ said von Hoensbroech.
"And they don’t improve. And that’s exactly the critique we have towards the Canadian system. The Canadian system is on track to becoming the most expensive system for passenger protection rules in the world, which will drive up ticket prices. So if this is the intention, then at least there should be a mission that the reliability of air travel improves. We don’t see how this will ever happen unless everyone in the sector is being held accountable.”
