Airline KLM says it is opening up China to Mersey firms. Alistair Houghton reports

DUTCH airline KLM provided Liverpool John Lennon Airport with its “connection to the rest of the world”. Now KLM’s Henri Hourcade wants to tell the world about it.

KLM launched its services from JLA to Liverpool in March, 2009, to great fanfare.

Its three daily services mean passengers from Liverpool can connect to hundreds of KLM’s destinations worldwide, from Shanghai to Angola, via KLM’s Amsterdam hub.

The airline is particularly keen to promote its growing range of flights to China. Economic regeneration agencies are keen to boost Liverpool’s links to China – and KLM says it is helping to open the country up to Merseyside entrepreneurs by offering flights to areas otherwise unserved by European airlines.

JLA is best-known for its wide range of low-cost flights to short-haul destinations in Europe.

KLM’s arrival means JLA can badge itself as a long-haul airport. So the airport and airline have been working together to make sure people know JLA is about more than budget flights.

This year, it launched an advertising campaign to promote its routes, starring local businesspeople and students.

Mr Hourcade, general manager for KLM and Air France in the UK and Ireland, was in Liverpool last week to meet some regular users of KLM’s services.

The meeting at the Hope Street Hotel included representatives from the universities and the Chinese community – all crucial customers for KLM.

Ahead of the meeting, Mr Hourcade told LDP Business that he was proud of the success of the route – and that KLM and the airport were now working hard to make more people aware of it.

He said: “We have operated this route to Amsterdam for more than two years, and it has been a success.

“We want to go on developing the awareness of KLM flying from Liverpool. The more that we can develop the awareness that we have a product flying from your home, all the better for us.”

Since arriving at JLA in 2009, KLM has carried almost 300,000 passengers on its flights from Liverpool. And some 60% of those passengers connect to flights to other destinations at Schiphol.

Hourcade is particularly excited about KLM’s growing portfolio of Chinese destinations, which he says will open up business opportunities in new parts of the country away from the well-trodden ground of Beijing, Shanghai and Hong Kong.

This year, for example, the airline launched a thrice-weekly flight from Amsterdam to Xiamen, a port city opposite Taiwan.

Announcing the route, the airline said: “KLM is the first and only European carrier in Xiamen offering non-stop direct flights to Europe.”

Mr Hourcade said: “KLM is really the European pioneer in opening up new cities in China.

“That’s a very important connection for Liverpool, with the Chinese community here and the investment Liverpool has put into its links with China – particularly the pavilion at the Shanghai Expo. The investment from KLM in China is there as well.”

The investment opportunities in cities such as Shanghai and Guangzhou are well-known in the UK. But, says Mr Hourcade, other cities such as Xiamen that are not yet household names here also offer great potential opportunities to UK firms.

He said: “There are some 160 cities with more than 1m people in China.

“These towns are growing in wealth. And we have a new clientele there, which is Chinese middle-class people going to Europe for the first time. They’re discovering long-haul flying. We are there for them. And we’re offering the connection to Liverpool.”

KLM has opened new routes to Rio de Janeiro in Brazil and Luanda in Angola – both cities which have strong oil and gas industries.

KLM did go up to four daily flights from Liverpool, but went down to three this summer. Mr Hourcade, however, says that should not be taken as a reduction of its commitment to Liverpool.

He said: “There was a big change in the way they organised the arrivals and departures in Amsterdam, so we could come back to three and maintain the excellent connectivity with flights to and from Liverpool. It was an adjustment.”

So will it stay at three flights a day?

“You never know,” smiled Mr Hourcade. “If we can grow the traffic, we will go to four. For the time being, we have three daily flights from Liverpool, and we’ve added new connections to destinations in China, Africa, South America.”

KLM has no plans to offer other direct flights to other destinations from Liverpool, instead preferring to focus on its Amsterdam connections.

“Our business model is based on a hub strategy,” said Mr Hourcade. “We feed long-haul destinations through our two platforms in Amsterdam and Paris Charles de Gaulle.

“Amsterdam is an airport brand which is very familiar to the UK market. It’s a very efficient airport.

“It’s not planned to open direct routes which are not in this core strategy.”

KLM’s passengers, says Mr Hourcade, enjoy flying from a smaller airport nearer their home.

“The airport has a very good product,” he said. “People want a high-quality service. These human-sized airports are appreciated by our customers.”

KLM is working with other local organisations, such as universities, to promote its routes. It has also started working with the team at the BT Convention Centre to help with the travel plans of delegates from across the globe.

“People come from all over the world to these conventions,” he said. “We facilitate that through KLM.”

And, equally, Mr Hourcade says KLM’s flights to Liverpool are helping to promote the city as an entry point to the UK for tourists.

The economic downturn, coupled with rising fuel costs, has made this a challenging period for airlines.

Global events this year have also affected Air France and KLM. Traffic to and from Japan dropped sharply after the massive earthquake and tsunami that devastated the country in March, and has not yet returned to pre-quake levels.

The uprisings in the Middle East and North Africa, meanwhile, have hit traffic, while flights to cities such as Tripoli have been suspended.

Mr Hourcade, however, remains upbeat about what the future holds for the Air France/KLM alliance.

“Times are challenging,” he said, “but we are optimistic because we are investing in our long-haul network. We’ve added 16 long-haul routes in one year.

“You know we are optimistic when we buy 110 planes in the first joint venture between Air France and KLM.

“In the last three months, our load factors have increased.

“You have to be flexible in tough times. We have looked at North America this winter and re-organised routes more to Central and South America, or China. We have to be flexible and go where demand is booming – to energy markets, for example. And we are looking at flows between Liverpool and China.”

Nick Smillie, aviation sales director for parent company Peel Airports, has worked closely with KLM since it first decided to come to Liverpool.

He said: “We’re getting nicely full planes now. We’re getting 70% full, which is good.

“What we need now are more inter-continental passengers. We need more people using us for long-haul flights via Amsterdam. That’s what makes the investment worth its while for KLM.

“When Henri Hourcade talks about raising awareness, it’s about getting it into people’s heads in Liverpool and the wider catchment area that you can fly long-haul from Liverpool.

“If you went out on the street and asked people what JLA was about, most of them would probably tell you it’s about low-cost flights to places like Spain, Italy and Poland.

“What KLM does is provide a three-times daily service via Amsterdam that connects to more than 600 destinations worldwide.

“Our European network is well-served by airlines such as Easyjet and Ryanair. But KLM single-handedly provided us with that connection to the rest of the world.”