UK Ferry Tickets

Credit crunches. Panic at the pumps. Doom and gloom at every turn: British consumers are being battered and bruised at the moment. Just in time, of course, for the holiday season.

But every cloud has a silver lining, and every crisis has a beneficiary. And so far 2008 seems to have been a good one for the powers that be at Eurostar.

The operator of the high speed rail link can boast of a 25% increase in tickets sales and an 18% increase in passenger numbers in the first half of the year. That’s a total of 4.63 million passengers from January to June this year.

The much heralded opening of St Pancras International has been hugely beneficial to Eurostar’s fortunes. Firstly the opening of a major architectural project in London provides the kind of media coverage that an advertising budget simply cannot buy.

And, more importantly, the St Pancras hub has opened up Eurostar as a cheap and convenient option for people living to the north of the all important Watford Gap. The Channel Tunnel may have been an exciting engineering feat but it didn’t quite spark the imagination of people who had to brave a six hour rail journey and then get stuck in London before they could even think about the joys of France.

Not so anymore it would appear: Derby has seen a 190% increase in passenger numbers, Nottingham a 133% rise, Leicester an increase of 113% and Manchester a jump of 52%. Fares to Paris from these cities start from as little as £77.

Basking in these results Eurostar is rewarding passengers with the introduction of 18^th daily service on the London to Paris route in September.

But should we enjoy this burst of optimism while we can? Eurostar’s Richard Brown thinks so:

“The impact of rising oil prices on air fares, combined with growing awareness of the much greater environmental impact of flying, are causing more and more travellers to switch from plane to train.  However, while we expect traveller numbers and ticket revenues to continue to rise, it is clear that the wider economic environment is deteriorating and we expect that the rate of growth will slow in the second half of the year.” 

So the future might not be all that bright. But let’s forget that for a while and sit back and enjoy this new, affordable and fashionable way to travel for a little longer yet.

Guest Article by Tom Hall

Friday, July 18th, 2008