Costs Rise At KLM

KLM Group has published its mid-year results, offering an insight into its performance.

The group published a revenue sum of EUR 5.6 billion, a 20% increase compared to one year prior. Meanwhile, operating profit reached EUR 129 million, down from the EUR 266 million reported in 2022. However, the group notes the 2022 figure included government NOW support.

Revenues stood at EUR 3.1 billion, up around EUR 300 million from one year prior. Improving results were more than present, as highlighted by the CFO at KLM. This aided thanks to the rising ticket prices that remained at an all-time high, and as such, revenues rose right across the network.

Despite this, the CFO notes that the first six months did see results, and the group remained under significant pressure as capacity development was lower—a critical catalyst is the available fleet and workforce. Cost management is now going to be more critical than ever as costs rise to manage the frustrations experienced group-wide.

It is clear that our customers are still very keen to travel, even though tickets are now more expensive. We are pleased that we can once again offer customers the service they expect from us. In fact, the demand for tickets was higher than the number of flights we could operate. The main reason being that aircraft are spending longer in the hangar for maintenance due to worldwide issues affecting component supply. 

Marjan Rintel, CEO KLM

Away from passenger operations, cargo revenue was another area of the business that dropped rapidly. However, KLM Group says given the passing pandemic that saw record cargo revenues, there was always going to be a drop. KLM believes this will still be essential to the group moving forward.