SHANNON Airport lost huge amounts of business for half a decade until 2013 when it started to reverse the trend and the successes it has recorded this year were acknowledged this week when it was highly commended at the World Routes Awards for airport marketing, held in Las Vegas.
This was global recognition for the Clare airport and Shannon was highly commended in the Airport Under 4 Million Passengers Category, in recognition of the success of its marketing programme since splitting from the DAA.
Shannon beat off stern competition from airports around the world to make the shortlist of five, with Darwin Internaional Airport, Kilimanjaro International Airport, Ekaterinburg Koltsovo Airport and Kyiv International Airport also included.
Darwin was named the overall winner, but Shannon was highly commended and received the second highest amount of preferences in the voting. Kilimanjaro was also highly commended.
No other airport in Ireland or Britain made the shortlist for any of the four awards, which are considered the most prestigious in the industry, as they are voted for and judged by airlines.
The airlines are asked to consider airports and destinations whose marketing efforts over the previous 12 months have made a real impact on their future network development plans.
Shannon CEO Neil Pakey was in Las Vegas for the awards ceremony and he said it has given the airport a very significant boost.
“This is a huge result for Shannon Airport as not only is it a great honour to be among the chosen few airports globally this year to be Highly Commended but it shows just how highly Shannon is now rated by airlines.
“Today we have some of the world’s leading news agencies and corporations around the world reporting on Shannon’s success and how it has managed to grow passengers in its first year of separation. That is promotion we could not buy. Even when he presented the award, BBC’s news correspondent Aaron Haslehurs remarked that after a period of decline, Shannon has experienced a sharp recovery in recent months with dramatic growth. That message has gone out right across the industry.”
Shannon’s head of aviation development Declan Power was also in Las Vegas and he said it shows Shannon is definitely recovering. “The fact that it is airlines who decide these prestigious awards proves that Shannon Airport is now very much back on their radar after a number of difficult years. This is a real sign of progress as airlines are clearly now sitting up and taking notice of Shannon and we intend to capitalise on this by securing new routes going forward.”
Shannon has added new routes to the US this year, with services to both Chicago and Philadelphia beginning, with United and US Airways respectively, being the airlines operating them.
Other good news for the airport was that the numbers using Shannon began to increase on a year-on-year basis in the month of June, while the momentum was sustained in July and August.
There is also strong speculation that there will be further positive announcements regarding the airport in the near future.
Owen Ryan has been a journalist with the Clare Champion since 2007, having previously worked with a number of other publications in Limerick, Cork and Galway. His first book will be published in December 2024.