Arajet Breaking Barriers in Canada’s Thriving Budget Airline Arena

Low cost and the flag carrier of Dominican Republic Arajet S.A is the latest entrant to Canada’s crowded budget airline market, is creating quite a buzz. Arajet will be launching flights between Dominican Republic and Toronto and Montreal this fall.

The airline’s ambitious vision is to provide Canadians with more affordable options for both domestic and international travel. To achieve this goal, Arajet focuses on a combination of cost-effective operations, modern technology, and a customer-centric approach.

This announcement comes two weeks after the U.S budget airline breeze Airways announced four round trips per week to each of the two cities to Quebecers bound for Florida.

The CEO of Arajet Victor Pacheco, says they are seeking to capitalize on a hub-and-spoke model that connects passengers from far-flung airports via their hub of Santo Domingo in Dominican Republic.

Evidently, more than 50% of the 10,000-plus Arajet tickets sold to Canadians so far are for other destinations in the Caribbean and Central and South America, to be reached through connecting flights from the Dominican Republic.

“The ULCCs (ultra-low-cost carriers) are mainly point-to-point airlines. We’re bidding on connections. And if we didn’t have that, it would be very difficult then to compete with Canadian carriers,” said the CEO.

According to the tourism ministry, over 700,000 tourists from Canada visited Dominican Republic last year following an ‘open skies’ agreement in February between the two countries allowing carriers to operate freely between them.

“I think the pie is growing. Competitors do react to us, they lower prices as well. And that means that now more people have access to travel even with them,” added the CEO.