Emirates Wants to Shake Up Ticket Sales Through Closer Ties to Travel Agencies
Photo Credit: Emirates' new A380, with premium economy seats. The airline is launching a new distribution strategy and portal. Emirates
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Emirates is one of the largest airlines yet to try to shake up how tickets are sold worldwide. Sabre is at the negotiation table to avoid a content cutoff in July, while other tech partners and travel agencies are still figuring out how to adapt to the new commercial model.
Emirates is hoping to return to profitability next year by trimming costs while recapturing demand ahead of its rivals.
The Dubai-based carrier has been revealing details about one of its newest strategies. It aims to make its distribution more cost-effective. In July, Emirates will adopt a carrot and stick approach to encourage travel agencies to get more of their content from its data feeds rather than from middlemen tech companies.
Emirates' "carrot" for travel agencies is that it has rolled out a digital portal to make it easier for agents to book products that the carrier has only been offering for sale via Emirates.com.
The "stick" is that — beginning on July 1 — Emirates will slap a surcharge on tickets booked through the software of global distribution system players. Travel agencies will avoid the fee by booking instead through the carrier's direct connection gateway, launched last October.
"Our strategy is to become more agile," said Adnan Abdul Fattah Kazim,
