Competition between NZ and the US: Air NZ-Qantas co-operating against foreign competition, new air services agreement with the USA and withdrawal of Pan Am from NZ

These three articles from the late 1980s focus on international aviation to New Zealand, and reflect upon the changing competitive environment. 

The first from 1988 reflects on large airlines in Europe and the US seen as likely to consolidate and become mega-carriers that threaten the competition of Air NZ and Qantas. Ultimately this would lead to the emergence of the three big airline alliances in the late 1990s (Star Alliance which Air NZ joined, OneWorld, which Qantas helped fund and Skyteam).  However, this article focuses primarily on whether Air NZ and Qantas could join forces to fend off US competition. Bear in mind that at that time, Qantas was solely an international airline (Australian Airlines remained the Australian state-owned domestic carrier competing with Ansett). Qantas was seen as much greater risk from competition, given demand for flights between the US and Australia, compared to New Zealand.  The claim was that the US-Australia/NZ market could get completely dominated by US carriers, which did not ultimately occur. It noted United made a net loss on Pacific routes of $70m (NZ) in 1986. Noted was that the key to Air NZ's success to/from the US was feeding Australia, which remains the case. 

The second reports on a newly minted air services agreement between the US and New Zealand that reflected the US being open to New Zealand's recently liberalised domestic airline market and approach to competition. It details the freeing up of restrictions on capacity and pricing (which still needed government approvals, but accelerated them) and noted that Air NZ would have more access to the US, with new airports it could fly to.

The third is a slightly older short article reflecting how Pan Am was withdrawing from New Zealand in 1986. Pan Am sold the rights to fly to the South Pacific to United Airlines, and would ultimately cease operations in 1991. It had started flying to NZ in 1937.

Dominion 12 February 1986

Air New Zealand domestic timetable October 1986 - March 1987 Part Two - The timetable

Without going into details about the flight timetable, noting it included several airports no longer served by Air New Zealand today (Oamaru, Kaitaia, Westport, Whakatane for example), Boeing 767 services consisted on average of one flight a day between Auckland and Wellington, three flights a week Auckland and Christchurch, with one flight a week with a Boeing 747 on that route. One flight a week from Christchurch to Wellington was operated by a Boeing 767. Thus the availability of Pacific Class (Business Class) on domestic services was very limited indeed!

The timetable has direct flights depicted rather simply, with a large series of connections. What was good about a printed timetable was the ease of seeing what services would operate on different days, and what connections might be available (but of course price of fares depends on availability which would only be known by contacting a travel agent).

Note the timetable includes timetables for multiple other airlines that Air New Zealand was co-ordinating with at the time notably:

• Mount Cook Airline (which Air New Zealand owned a significant shareholding in)
• Eagle Airways (which Air New Zealand ultimately bought)
• Safe Air (which supplied passenger service to the Chatham Islands using an Armstrong Whitworth Argosy passenger pod inserted in the freighter's fuselage)
• Bell Air (operating Auckland to Whakatane)
• Southern Air (operating from Invercargill to Stewart Island)

Auckland departures

Auckland departures

Auckland and Blenheim departures

Blenheim and Christchurch departures

Christchurch departures

Christchurch departures

Christchurch and Dunedin departures

Dunedin departures

Gisborne departures

Gisborne and Hamilton departures

Hamilton and Hokitika departures

Hokitika and Invercargill departures

Invercargill and Kaitaia departures

Kaitaia and Napier departures

Napier and Nelson departures

Nelson departures

Nelson and New Plymouth departures

New Plymouth, Oamaru and Palmerston North departures

Palmerston North and Rotorua departures

Rotorua and Taupo departures

Taupo and Tauranga departures

Tauranga and Timaru departures

Timaru and Wanganui departures

Wanganui and Wellington departures

Wellington departures

Wellington, Westport and Whakatane departures

Whakatane and Whangarei departures

Mount Cook Airline timetable

Mount Cook Airline timetable

Mount Cook Airline and Safe Air timetable

Bell Air and Eagle Airways timetables

Eagle Airways and Southern Air timetables

Air New Zealand domestic timetable October 1986 - March 1987 Part One - Information pages

This timetable is the last Air New Zealand summer domestic timetable before the introduction of competition with Ansett New Zealand.  Below is a scan of all of the pages, and because there are 33 of them, I thought it prudent to highlight the key points of interest beforehand.

Under passenger information it describes that the airline operates Boeing 737s, 767s and 747s on main-trunk routes, and 737s on some provincial routes, with Fokker F27 Friendships on other provincial routes. Business class (branded Pacific Class) was only available on 767 and 747 operated services. 

Check-in time for 737 and F27 services was only 15 minutes, 20 minutes for 767 and 30 minutes for 747 flights. Recall there was no domestic airline security.

Discount airfares were available under the following categories:

• Epic fares (35% discount) for early purchase of fares on most F27 and many jet flights outside holiday periods
• Thrifty and Super Thrifty fares on main trunk routes, at specific times outside holiday periods
• 30% off for senior citizens on specified flights

On board catering consisted of:

• Light meals for business class passengers (767 and 747 flights) with newspapers on morning and evening flights, and complementary headsets to use inflight audio entertainment systems
• Light snacks and beverages on specified services from Auckland-Wellington, Auckland-Christchurch and Wellington-Dunedin (737 services of at least 1 hour).  This was Danish pastries on early morning services. Lunch and evening periods had "club" and "open-faced" sandwiches.
• Cheese, biscuits and beverages served on other 737 services (except Dunedin-Invercargill) and on longer F27 routes (Auckland-Gisborne, Auckland-Napier, Auckland-Nelson, Auckland-Palmerston North, Wellington-Gisborne, Wellington-Hamilton, Wellington-Tauranga, Wellington-Rotorua and Wellington-Timaru, Christchurch-Napier, Christchurch-Palmerston North)
• Fruit juice only between Wellington-Christchurch and Christchurch-Dunedin.

Sample standard airfares were:

• Auckland-Wellington $140.80 ($421 in 2023 prices)
• Wellington-Nelson $78.10 ($233 in 2023 prices)
• Christchurch-Invercargill $138.60 ($415 in 2023 prices)

The timetable itself also includes timetables for Mount Cook Airline and Eagle Airways (by this time co-ordinating with Air New Zealand), Safeair services to the Chatham Islands, Bell Air and Southern Air. 

It also includes ground transport from airports, which in almost all cases was a commercial arrangement by particular bus operators in each city and town. Palmerston North was the largest city with no scheduled service to and from the airport, with Hokitika and Westport the smallest airports with passenger services between airport and town.

Auckland had Johnson's Blue Motors operating a regular bus service every half hour for $6 ($18 in 2023 values)

Wellington had Guthrey's operating a regular scheduled bus service every 20 minutes weekdays for $3 ($9 in 2023 values)

Christchurch had the publicly owned Christchurch Transport Board operating a regular service as part of the local bus network for $2.40 ($7 in 2023 values)

Of note was a single daily bus service between Masterton and Wellington Airport, operated by Transport Wairarapa, stopping through the Wairarapa and at Upper Hutt, and returning once.  Fare of $8.50 ($25 in 2023 values).

Also included is a domestic air cargo price schedule, list of Air New Zealand sales and agent offices, and a domestic route map finishing off with a Billy T. James fronted ad for Thrifty airfares.

Air New Zealand domestic timetable Effective 26 October 1986 - 28 March 1987

Contents page and Hertz

Guide and passenger information

Passenger information

Standard domestic airfares

Airport ground transport

Domestic air cargo information

Air New Zealand offices and agents

Route map and Billy T advertising Thrifty Fares

Mount Cook Airline Timetable 01 October 1986

 

Mount Cook Airline route map 1986

Mount Cook Airline timetable glossary

Mount Cook Airline fare and service terms and conditions

Mount Cook Airline special flights and VIP service

Mount Cook Airline timetable departures from Alexandra, Auckland and Bay of Islands

Mount Cook Airline timetable departures from Christchurch

Mount Cook Airline timetable departures from Dunedin, Milford Sound and Mount Cook

Mount Cook Airline timetable departures from Mount Cook, Queenstown and Rotorua

Mount Cook Airline timetable departures from Rotorua and Te Anau

Mount Cook Airline timetable departures from Te Anau and Wellington

Mount Cook Airline timetable office and agents

Mount Cook Airline timetable offices

The timetable above for Mount Cook Airlines was about at the peak of the airline's operations before Air New Zealand took substantial and eventually full control of the airline, before absorbing it completely into its operations.

The Mount Cook Group had a long history in the tourism sector in New Zealand, initially with long-distance coach services. From 1920 to 1961, rather erratically, there were a number of Mount Cook airline operations with charter services, but from 1961 it started operating scheduled services (see more here).

Services were initially operated by Douglas DC-3s, focused on flying Christchurch-Mount Cook to Queenstown, noting that Mount Cook airfield was built by the Mount Cook Group many years before for its charter services (this would later become an issue when Newmans Air became a competitor and Mount Cook Group was uninterested in letting it fly to its own privately owned airport).

From 1968 Mount Cook Airline started flying Hawker Siddeley HS748s, its first fully-pressurised aircraft and established its core route - Auckland-Rotorua-Christchurch-Mount Cook-Queenstown. At the time, domestic airline services were heavily regulated, so it had effectively a statutory monopoly on this route (state-owned NAC, later Air New Zealand did NOT operate this route).  With the death of Sir Henry Wigley (a founder of the Mount Cook Group) in 1980, Air New Zealand subsequently acquired a small shareholding in the airline, increasing this to 30% in 1983, up to 47% in October 1985 as Air New Zealand sought to avoid the Mount Cook Group becoming the basis for a serious competitor to it.  

In 1986 the Mount Cook Group was focused on not just airline services, but its "Landline" brand of scheduled, tour and charter coach services, including the Auckland-Wellington Landliner and similar services from Auckland to Napier/Hastings, Christchurch to Queenstown and connecting services to Mount Cook (it was notable as a coach operator with buses that had on-board bathrooms, which was unknown in most competitions, such as NZR Road Services and Newmans).

Mount Cook Group was a growing tourism operator, with also a solid business in sightseeing flights to Te Anau and Milford.

In October 1986 this timetable saw Mount Cook Airline as connecting with Air New Zealand's services, with the key trunk Mount Cook route supplemented by services from Dunedin to Queenstown via Alexandra operated by Britten Norman Islander aircraft, the Auckland-Kerikeri (Bay of Islands) route with Piper Chieftains. 

In 1991 Air New Zealand acquired the remaining shares in Mount Cook Airline and it became a fully-owned subsidiary, based in Christchurch. As with Eagle Airways and Air Nelson, Air New Zealand treated Mount Cook Airline as one of its regional domestic airline operations.  Mount Cook's operations transitioned in the 1990s to the Aerospatiale ATR-72, and Mount Cook Airline essentially operated any domestic services using the largest turboprop aircraft (Air Nelson would operate the Bombardier/De Havilland Q300/Dash 8 and Eagle Airways the Beechcraft B-1900). In 2019 Air New Zealand would fully integrate Mount Cook Airline's operations.

In 1986 Mount Cook Airline was noted as having a rather better level of inflight service than Air New Zealand on domestic routes, noting "on long-haul services (!), the refreshments we offer include fruit juice, sandwiches, cake, fresh fruit, cheese and crackers, coffee or tea". Note the absence of any alcoholic beverages on domestic flights. Baggage allowance was 16kg (whereas 23kg is the standard today). Checkin time was 20 minutes. 

Also notable is the statement that a HS748 could be reconfigured into a VIP layout with "meeting tables, bar and full galley facilities", I wonder how often that happened?

Note at the time of this timetable, Air New Zealand did NOT fly to Queenstown or Kerikeri.  Finally, it is worth noting that for a brief period, Mount Cook Airlines considered flying internationally from Christchurch to Australia.  3rdlevelNZ blog has the story as part of its history of the airline. 

Today Air New Zealand does not operate services to several of the airports operated by Mount Cook Airline at the time of this timetable. Alexandra, Te Anau, Milford and indeed Mount Cook Airport.  Regular services to Mount Cook Airport ceased in 2002, although there was a short resumption of service from December 2012 till January 2013.  So there is literally no airline service to Mount Cook!