Qatar Airways on Tuesday launched new service between Doha and San Francisco with four weekly flights, a significant decision in the midst of the pandemic .

In fact, the Middle East-based airline has now launched five new destinations since the onset of the coronavirus earlier this year.

So TravelPulse’s Rich Thomaselli talked with Qatar Airways executive Mark Drusch, SVP of Revenue Management, Alliances and Strategy at the airline, about the new 15-hour flight to SFO and what’s next for Qatar Airways.

TravelPulse (TP): The most obvious question is ... why? It's one thing for domestic airlines to add some routes that don't eat up a lot of costs. This is a significant route for Qatar.

Mark Drusch (MD): That’s a great question, Rich, and one that requires some context.

Qatar Airways was one of the only airlines that never stopped flying (during the pandemic) in order to take stranded passengers home to their loved ones, maintaining a network that never fell below 30 destinations since the onset of the pandemic. Throughout COVID-19, we continued operations to the U.S., with flights to both Chicago and Dallas-Fort Worth maintained during the entire period in order to take more than 260,000 Americans home to their loved ones.

By fulfilling our mission of taking people home in the U.S. and across the globe, we became the largest international carrier between April to July, according to IATA data. This enabled us to accumulate unmatched experience in carrying passengers safely and reliably, and uniquely positioned us to effectively rebuild our network. We have not only reinstated existing global and U.S. destinations – since the onset of the pandemic, we have added seven entirely new destinations, including San Francisco. In fact, we also just announced Seattle as our latest destination (beginning in 2021). With the addition of Seattle, we’ll fly to 11 U.S. destinations , which is more than we operated pre-COVID-19.

So, back to your original question – why launch a new international route amid a pandemic? Over the course of rebuilding our network, we’ve sought out ways to increase connectivity for our customers with new and relevant destination ... We’ve also seen increased demand for leisure destinations that make social distancing easy – from the Maldives to Zanzibar. Additionally, the strong relationship with our U.S. airline partners, American Airlines and Alaska Airlines in SFO in particular has added to our confidence in the success of the new routes.

TP: Between fewer people traveling and restrictions in place, international travel has plummeted this year. What research, what key metrics, led you to believe there was a demand for this route?

MD: Adding San Francisco as our fifth new destination launched since the onset of the pandemic was a no-brainer. As the gateway to Silicon Valley and the vibrant tech economy, the Bay area is a globally important destination with a significant traffic base of both business and leisure travelers – especially people itching to visit friends, families or business partners overseas.

San Francisco is also one of the few top 15 metro areas in the U.S. that is not served directly by Qatar Airways, representing a significant business and leisure market that requires superior connections to our global network. The San Francisco service will offer excellent connections from the U.S. to more than 100 destinations, including India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Iraq, Nepal, East Africa, South Africa, and of course the Middle East and Levant, via the most customer-friendly airport in the Middle East that consistently leads the way in safety and security measures.

In fact, given demand for this route, we’ve already upped our frequencies from San Francisco. We initially announced we’d be flying four weekly flights from SFO starting December 15. We expect to announce frequency increases to get to daily service soon.

TP: I believe (fellow Middle East airline) Etihad dropped the route to SFO a few years ago. Did that have anything to do with the decision even though Emirates maintains the same route?

MD: I’m not able to comment on competitive decisions. What I can say is that Qatar Airways accumulated unmatched experience in carrying passengers safely and reliably throughout the pandemic as one of the only airlines that never stopped flying, as I mentioned earlier. This uniquely positioned us to effectively rebuild our network through reinstating destinations and adding new destinations in line with demand.

I’d also like to highlight that the San Francisco service will be operated by Qatar Airways’ sustainable and state-of-the-art Airbus A350-900, featuring 36 seats in the award-winning Qsuite. Business Class passengers flying with us from SFO can enjoy the Qsuite business class seat with its enhanced privacy, including sliding privacy doors and the option to use a ‘Do Not Disturb (DND)’ indicator. The Qsuite seat layout is a 1-2-1 configuration, providing passengers to the Middle East and beyond with the most spacious, fully private, comfortable and social distanced Business Class product in the sky.

TP: What is on the horizon for Qatar in terms of routes to the U.S.? Will Miami and/or Atlanta service be restored? Any other cities to watch out for?

MD: The U.S. market is and will continue to be an important strategic market for us. After maintaining operations to take more than 260,000 passengers home to the U.S. since the onset of the pandemic, we remain committed to helping American travelers get home safely to see their loved ones.

On December 8, we announced that in March 2021, Seattle will become our seventh new destination since the onset of the pandemic and the second in the U.S. (Seattle will join existing U.S. destinations including Boston (BOS), Chicago (ORD), Dallas-Fort Worth (DFW), Houston (IAH), Los Angeles (LAX), Miami (MIA), New York (JFK), Philadelphia (PHL), San Francisco (SFO) and Washington, D.C. (IAD)).

With San Francisco and Seattle as new U.S. destinations, we will provide global connectivity to the U.S. via 59 weekly flights to 11 destinations – which is more U.S. destinations than we operated pre-COVID-19. Plus, these flights connect onwards to hundreds of American cities through strategic partnerships with American Airlines, Alaska Airlines and JetBlue .

In advance of the holiday season, we also announced additional U.S. flights, which included resuming services to Miami (MIA) with two weekly flights and increasing weekly frequencies to both Chicago (ORD) and New York (JFK).

We will continue to monitor the success of our existing services and the post-COVID growth of the U.S. market to determine if we re-enter ATL or add other U.S. services.