If there is a strike at Deutsche Bahn (DB), this helps providers of long-distance bus travel to attract more passengers – not just for a short time while the trains are not running, but permanently. This is the conclusion of a study published on Wednesday by the Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW). Accordingly, the increase in bookings is particularly high among people who have never traveled by long-distance bus before.
For the study, the researchers evaluated data on major strikes in the rail network in 2014. At that time, the train drivers’ union (GDL) fought a bitter industrial dispute with the railways for almost a year. The train drivers repeatedly stopped working.
Long-distance bus transport benefited from this in the long term: during the first wave of strikes, bookings shot up by 32 percent. “After the strike, bookings on the affected routes were on average at least eight percent higher than before,” the IfW stated.
The sustained increase is due in particular to travelers who are using the bus for the first time. The researchers concluded that many passengers remained loyal to the alternative means of transport after being forced to switch. The results showed “the importance of the reliability of offers for customer retention”. The long-distance bus could be an alternative, especially for leisure travellers. The increase in bookings was particularly high at the weekend.
The IfW explains that the bus is not so attractive for longer distances. The travelers were mainly on shorter routes by bus. The researchers analyzed over four months “detailed booking data” from the then long-distance bus operator MeinFernbus for connections between 33 major German cities. They then compared these with the emergency timetables and travel times of the DB.
