Whoever joins the game often has one thought first: start the game from your home airport. The first hub – it should be the nearest airport that you know. But that’s exactly what you shouldn’t do most of the time. Regional airports are usually smaller, have a low category and a low demand for freight and passengers. For this reason, you should choose good hubs for the time being, as hubs are getting more expensive and you won’t be able to afford your next one for a few months.
Profit VS Patriotism
Of course, the entire article only applies if you want to be successful in Airlines Manager and make a profit as quickly as possible. You can find further helpful and useful tips in the article Airlines Manager Tips and Tricks . If you are more of a patriotist and want to choose your home airport as your first hub, this is of course okay – but it will take some time until you have many routes and planes. So some fun is lost.
My tip therefore: Your first hub should be a large international hub, your second or third hub can then be your home airport. You take the profits from the large hub and invest them in the smaller regional airport. You can also find out how to plan good routes from large international airports in the article Best routes in Airlines Manager.
Choosing the right hub
Choosing the right hub can be broken down into two essential factors, both of which are extremely important for a hub. These are:
- Passenger demand and freight demand at the relevant hub
- Number of routes from the relevant hub
On the one hand, passenger demand is extremely important. Note that it depends on which type your fleet is. I would say 99% of the players are economy players. This means that passenger demand for economy should be a top priority. On the other hand, of course, the routes must also be considered from the hub, whereby a distinction must also be made here between short, medium and long distance routes.
Of course you can differentiate between both factors and give them in detail. For this reason, I would like to explain both factors to you in more detail so that you can find your strategy.
Passenger demand
Most players start with an economy fleet. This means that economy seats are the most important – the more, the better. You can find out which aircraft are the best for economy in the article Seats and planes in airlines Manager read. Above all, pay attention to the various factors that arise between the classes. For this reason, the hub you choose should have a large number of economy demands. Often there is also a remaining capacity for freight, which means that freight demand should not be disregarded.
There is a high demand for economy passengers in the Airlines Manager Tycoon in Asian and African countries. Nevertheless, the Asian hubs are to be preferred, as the airport category of the airports in the Asian region is higher.
Number of routes
There are actually two things to consider when choosing routes. On the one hand, the number of routes in the areas of short, medium and long haul. A hub on an island in the middle of the Pacific won’t do you much good in the short haul. For this reason, you should use central locations – mostly in Asia. You should avoid Australia or extremely southern, northern, western or eastern parts for the time being, as this is limiting yourself.
The other factor is the reachable airports in times, which can be divided by a factor of 168. These are, for example, flight times of 8, 12, 24 or 28 hours. If your routes with the selected aircraft (note the speed here) are in that area, you can quickly utilize your aircraft to 100%. Therefore, as many routes as possible should be in this area – preferably in the categories 6, 8, 12 and 24 hours.