crckwc1

Can anyone give an educated guess about these airfares? Buy now or wait and they'll come down? During the past week, the fares have slowly crept up a bit. I had been hoping to see lower fares around this time of year.

DFW-CDG-DFW late May, return early July - $1337, 1-stop w/ good connection

DFW-FRA-DFW Dec. 4-14 - $1187 non-stop

Thanks.
k

amer_can

Depends on where you are going..Germany and/or connecting..Paris and/or connecting. Either airport is huge, confusing, and frustrating..$1187 seems the no brainer, but does Dec4-14 have any relevance?? Summer fare for $1337 doesn't sound bad at all. where is the stop and do you have to make a connection?? Facter this in.

greg

The prices don't seem to be outrageously out of line. But realize that the prices are market driven and not by calendar. If price reduction took place in some month in 2012, it only meant that the market condition happened to force vendors to lower prices at that point in time. This is certainly not done in your favor, but by looking at sales forecast, they felt lowering price on some segments improved overall network revenue. The sawtooth type of pricing are common on many segments I have looked at. Slow creeping prices, $1~$2/day, probably has several objectives. I have not found business analysis on this subject, but I felt this is a no-brainer for airlines. If the sales are stagnant and if the airlines still have time, why not let the price creep up? If might panic people into buying low demand tickets. If the demand picks up later or even if they had to lower prices, they captured additional revenue from people panicked into buying tickets. You can see some idea of what kind of game is being played by collecting the empirical data on price trend for THIS YEAR, seat occupancy rate by looking at how many empty seats area left, what kind of seats are left (if desirable seats are still available, ask why?), how fast the seats are going away. If the seats are going away steadily or near full this far away, it is unlikely they would offer price reductions in coming months. But all these are guesses.

yestravel

greg - I think your analysis is excellent. Exactly what you describe occurred on my UA flight to CDG this winter. Prices kept going up by a few $s, dropped a bit and stayed the same for about one month. Lots of empty seats on the flight and suddenly 3 weeks before my departure the fares dropped about $90 & remain there. Its like playing roulette, but what you describe seems to be valid.

crckwc1

Thanks for your input. I booked a non-stop on Lufthansa, DFW-FRA-DFW for Dec.4-14 (yeah, way ahead I know) for $1187. The fare might come down but I'm set and won't worry about it. I can't wait until November to hope prices come down. Will wait a bit on the DFW-CDG-DFW flight for May 30-July 02. Right now it's $1339-$1378, one stop, good connection time. Will probably purchase within a couple of weeks. Can't stand the suspense. lol

crckwc1

amer_can - yes, Dec 4-14 is relevant in that those dates are the only ones I'm free to go to Germany for the Christmas markets.

yestravel

Be aware that flights over 30 days may go up in price. That may be the case with your May 30 - July 2 trip. I'm with you on buying ahead just to have everything settled.

downing6153

We are doing Germany next September and the r/t n/s fare from Newark to Frankfurt is around $900 per person. I thought that was high so I kept checking daily. About 2 weeks ago on a Saturday, it dropped to $745. We jumped on it. I'd recommend giving it some time and check daily. You might catch a break. Does anyone understand how airlines set fares? I certainly don't. Good luck, Tom

amer_can

Christmas Markets..Great experience and you will have such a good time. We were in Germany end of Nov. early Dec. and the weather was decent but needed layers..Shetland sweater, tweed blazer and a fleece poncho did the job. The poncho was a god send due ro short comforters and long husband's feet at night.

crckwc1

A few days ago I found a good fare on Vayama (which I've used successfully in the past) - DFW-MUC CDG-DFW May 29-July 2, one stop each way with good connection times, equipment by AA and Air Canada, for $1187 (oddly, the same price I paid for the Christmas market trip). Yea! I looked at the website today and the fare has gone up over $200 so I'm quite pleased with my "find." Thanks to all for your help and comments.