• Our booking engine at tickets.railforums.co.uk (powered by TrainSplit) helps support the running of the forum with every ticket purchase! Find out more and ask any questions/give us feedback in this thread!

New easyBus service between Heathrow and Shepherd's Bush

Status
Not open for further replies.

radamfi

Established Member
Joined
29 Oct 2009
Messages
9,267
easyBus will start a new service between Heathrow and Shepherd's Bush from 1 July. Fares will generally start from £2 but as an introductory offer all fares are 50p or £1 for travel 1-14 July if you book by 11 June. There is a 50p booking fee unless you have Maestro.

This is the first easyBus service that is fully within the TfL area.

If you have to pay at least £2 normally, it is clearly not great value compared to the Tube, especially if you have to get the Tube on from Shepherd's Bush. The off-peak Tube fare from Heathrow to Zone 1 is £3.10 and it is £2.30 from Shepherd's Bush to Zone 1.
 
Sponsor Post - registered members do not see these adverts; click here to register, or click here to log in
R

RailUK Forums

dzug2

Member
Joined
5 Feb 2011
Messages
867
Almost 24x7 - though infrequent after midnight

And they seem to have settled on £1.95 rather than £2 as the base fare
 

radamfi

Established Member
Joined
29 Oct 2009
Messages
9,267
It is extended to Waterloo from 5 October. Fares from £1 each way (plus 50p booking fee, except for Maestro).
 

Greenback

Emeritus Moderator
Joined
9 Aug 2009
Messages
15,268
Location
Llanelli
I'm sure that this will attract plenty of people through the advertising of the fares and the 'Easy' branding alone.
 

34D

Established Member
Joined
9 Feb 2011
Messages
6,042
Location
Yorkshire
It is extended to Waterloo from 5 October. Fares from £1 each way (plus 50p booking fee, except for Maestro).

The card brand that is now defunct? My current account maestro has just been reissued as a Debit Mastercard.
 

radamfi

Established Member
Joined
29 Oct 2009
Messages
9,267
The card brand that is now defunct? My current account maestro has just been reissued as a Debit Mastercard.

You can still get a Quidity Maestro card, and of course in many European countries, Maestro is the principal debit card brand.
 

deltic

Established Member
Joined
8 Feb 2010
Messages
3,201
I'm sure that this will attract plenty of people through the advertising of the fares and the 'Easy' branding alone.

I'm always surprised how few people I ever see on Easy airport buses in London - often they are completely empty.
 

Greenback

Emeritus Moderator
Joined
9 Aug 2009
Messages
15,268
Location
Llanelli
Maybe some of them, at least, aren't in service and are just going to or from the start point? I doubt they'd be happy to run at a loss, at least not for an extended period of time.
 

BestWestern

Established Member
Joined
6 Feb 2011
Messages
6,736
How on earth does anybody make a profit on fares that are peanuts? Are these proper buses or is EasyBus still Ford Transits?
 

BestWestern

Established Member
Joined
6 Feb 2011
Messages
6,736
Not all fares are "peanuts". They use Renault minibuses nowadays.

Well if you have just 16 or so passengers, and some are paying almost nothing, I can't see there being a worthwhile profit margin. The standard fare would need to be not too excessive in comparison to the headline promotional fare, otherwise people will simply turn away and not use the service.
 

Bletchleyite

Veteran Member
Joined
20 Oct 2014
Messages
97,554
Location
"Marston Vale mafia"
Well if you have just 16 or so passengers, and some are paying almost nothing, I can't see there being a worthwhile profit margin. The standard fare would need to be not too excessive in comparison to the headline promotional fare, otherwise people will simply turn away and not use the service.

Because they are minibuses and thus require only D1 rather than D, the drivers are much cheaper.
 

Bletchleyite

Veteran Member
Joined
20 Oct 2014
Messages
97,554
Location
"Marston Vale mafia"
Would they carry bigger loads than they currently do with a proper coach?

I wonder if they might. The history of easyBus is a strange one - they've toyed with minibuses the whole way through, while Brian Souter came steamrollering in and got the concept spot-on with large coaches and Megabus.

It'd be like starting up easyJet with Cessnas.

The minibuses might lend themselves well to a US-style airport-to-hotel shuttle, but that's not what they're operating.
 

deltic

Established Member
Joined
8 Feb 2010
Messages
3,201
Would they carry bigger loads than they currently do with a proper coach?

Not with the loads I see them carrying - very few people on those traveling from Waterloo to Gatwick. The coach operations that are branded Easybus are run by National Express ie those from Victoria to Luton and Gatwick
 

Greenback

Emeritus Moderator
Joined
9 Aug 2009
Messages
15,268
Location
Llanelli
Is the Easybus target market visitors who don't really understand the pricing of their competitors? Is the strategy to lure people in with dirt cheap headline fares and then hope that they will just pay whatever fare is being offered for the date and time that they want? Do they get a lot of custom from people on the outskirts of central London?

I haven't registered the buses I've seen as being particularly full or empty. I don't really know much about their business model. it just seems to em that they must have some reliance on being a well known brand, at least across Europe, and they must make money somehow!
 

BestWestern

Established Member
Joined
6 Feb 2011
Messages
6,736
All I ever see of it is the sticker on the side of NatEx Levantes saying they accept EasyBus tickets. Seems like a rather pointless operation to me?!
 

deltic

Established Member
Joined
8 Feb 2010
Messages
3,201
Is the Easybus target market visitors who don't really understand the pricing of their competitors? Is the strategy to lure people in with dirt cheap headline fares and then hope that they will just pay whatever fare is being offered for the date and time that they want? Do they get a lot of custom from people on the outskirts of central London?

I haven't registered the buses I've seen as being particularly full or empty. I don't really know much about their business model. it just seems to em that they must have some reliance on being a well known brand, at least across Europe, and they must make money somehow!

I struggle to understand their business model to. They started off with the idea of entering the UK coach market but their advisors did not seem to understand the market and the service from Milton Keynes to outer London which they started off with didnt last that long. Not surprisingly they moved onto the airport market but again have struggled to make real inroads and now lend their brand to some conventional London-airport links provided by National Express.

In some ways I see them a bit like Virgin - have a strong brand and good pricing model but dont really understand the operational bit and hence would prefer a more established player to work along side. With the exception of the airline have any of the other "Easy" businesses ever taken off - pardon the pun.
 

Bletchleyite

Veteran Member
Joined
20 Oct 2014
Messages
97,554
Location
"Marston Vale mafia"
I struggle to understand their business model to. They started off with the idea of entering the UK coach market but their advisors did not seem to understand the market and the service from Milton Keynes to outer London which they started off with didnt last that long.

I don't know where on earth they got the idea of MK to London from; it was doomed from day one. Who on earth would use an infrequent service to outer London from a place that has frequent trains with cheap off peak fares *and* a frequent service of National Express coaches at even cheaper fares?

They should have started with something like Manchester to London.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---
In some ways I see them a bit like Virgin - have a strong brand and good pricing model but dont really understand the operational bit and hence would prefer a more established player to work along side. With the exception of the airline have any of the other "Easy" businesses ever taken off - pardon the pun.

Someone told me that they nearly got into bed with Stagecoach, and what became Megabus could have ended up as easyBus. But for whatever reason it didn't work out, and the rest was history.
 

radamfi

Established Member
Joined
29 Oct 2009
Messages
9,267
http://www.route-one.net/industry/album-conference-sir-brians-big-idea/

When, in 2003, after Sir Brian came back as Stagecoach CEO following a disastrous period for the company with its ill-fated venture buying Coach USA, under former CEO Keith Cochrane who resigned in 2002, he says: “I looked at the market in the UK and thought that there was an opportunity to re-invent express services.”

He went to see EasyJet boss Stelios Haji-Ioannou, who had come up with an idea for EasyBus. “They had a great brand and I tried to do a deal with him, as we already had a great footprint, and could build a fantastic business under his brand, but basically he wanted too much money.

“There was a value to us for EasyBus, but it wasn’t the value he thought it was. So I said to him, we’re going to do this – Megabus – anyway, and if you’re going to do EasyBus you’d better get a pair of trainers on as I’m going to go really, really fast from here.

“I couldn’t persuade my predecessor [Keith Cochrane] to do this and time was moving on. I thought ‘we’re going to be sat here as a big fat donkey bus company if we don’t do this’. It was a massive opportunity.”
 

Greenback

Emeritus Moderator
Joined
9 Aug 2009
Messages
15,268
Location
Llanelli
I struggle to understand their business model to.

I'm so glad it's not just me!

They started off with the idea of entering the UK coach market but their advisors did not seem to understand the market and the service from Milton Keynes to outer London which they started off with didnt last that long. Not surprisingly they moved onto the airport market but again have struggled to make real inroads and now lend their brand to some conventional London-airport links provided by National Express.

I can see the sense in not operating buses at all, and allowing their brand to be used to allow other operators tor each customers that they maybe wouldn't otherwise.

I can see that having a variety of pick ups just outside the central area of London might secure them some custom, but that's about all I can make any sense of.

In some ways I see them a bit like Virgin - have a strong brand and good pricing model but dont really understand the operational bit and hence would prefer a more established player to work along side. With the exception of the airline have any of the other "Easy" businesses ever taken off - pardon the pun.

That makes sense!

Do they still do hotels and car hire?!

I'm sure I've seen adverts for different Easy offers across the web. Easy Cruise has definitely finished, but Easy Hotels seem to be still going.
 

AndyW33

Member
Joined
12 Aug 2013
Messages
534
but Easy Hotels seem to be still going.
They are, they have 21 hotels across the UK and the rest of Europe. But just like the stickers on the National Express vehicles, it is a branding exercise. The hotels don't belong to easyGroup, they're franchised.
 

Bletchleyite

Veteran Member
Joined
20 Oct 2014
Messages
97,554
Location
"Marston Vale mafia"
They are, they have 21 hotels across the UK and the rest of Europe. But just like the stickers on the National Express vehicles, it is a branding exercise. The hotels don't belong to easyGroup, they're franchised.

So, to be fair, are a very large number of other chain hotels.
 

Greenback

Emeritus Moderator
Joined
9 Aug 2009
Messages
15,268
Location
Llanelli
Indeed. I've never thought they were owned by Easy Group, it's just another example of the brand being seen as adding value, whether in a franchise or by some other method of partnership.
 

deltic

Established Member
Joined
8 Feb 2010
Messages
3,201
Someone told me that they nearly got into bed with Stagecoach, and what became Megabus could have ended up as easyBus. But for whatever reason it didn't work out, and the rest was history.

Never knew that - just imagine what would have happened if they had partnered up. It would be easy to see an Easybus branded Stagecoach operated coach service really taking on National Express and being a massive player in the transport market.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.

Top