A love letter to FlixBus

Dear FlixBus team,

I am writing you this heartfelt letter as probably one of your most affectionate clients. So much so that the term client feels somewhat inaccurate: perhaps believer, or even follower, would be more appropriate.

A friend of mine recently asked me, after a 10-hour trip of mine turned into a 13-hour one due to a car accident, when I would finally understand that my love for FlixBus is not reciprocal. This was not the first time he asked me this. I, however, believe that love does not necessarily have to be reciprocal. I enjoy the act of loving, even without being loved back. And this is how I recently booked a trip to Seville by bus (I must admit: I will only be taking a FlixBus to Barcelona, and then switching to another company with a direct connection to Seville).

I am writing this letter after receiving an email from another transportation company, which made me think: wow, I wish FlixBus did this. Maybe I should write it to them?

In any case, I have done quite a few ridiculously long trips on your lime-green buses, cruising through Europe at night. I believe my longest ones were around 28 hours: one between Rennes and Bern, and another between Milan and Berlin.

The latter was originally supposed to be 18 hours, but the night before the trip you (not you personally, of course) sent me an email titled "your booking number has changed". This was not only meant to inform me of a booking number change, as I foolishly believed, but also to communicate that my bus had been delayed by three hours and extended by two more, resulting in a whopping 28-hour journey for me (and my unfortunate but lovely girlfriend).

Now, as I hope is clear, I hold no grudge for this. Unfortunately, I cannot provide proof of my loyalty through the number of trips that I have taken, which brings me to my first suggestion:

1) Provide a complete and persistent history of purchased tickets across devices

Currently, if you change device, you lose your past tickets.

I believe there are many clients like me who go to great lengths to avoid flying. Since trains are still not well connected across Europe, we take buses instead.

However, even if we do this for a noble cause, we are still human. After enough long and uncomfortable journeys (not due to fault, but due to duration), our loyalty might weaken. At some point, those beautiful flying machines might start to look more appealing, and we may begin to wonder whether the personal sacrifice is worth the CO₂ saved.

Which leads me to my second suggestion:

2) Provide meaningful statistics

Miles traveled, average journey length, CO₂ saved compared to flights — things that make you feel better (but maybe not your back) after an 18-hour bus ride instead of a 1-hour flight. Maybe even a congratulatory email.

I am usually skeptical of this kind of corporate behavior, but you do so little of it that it reminds me of my high school crush, who acted like she didn't care, but secretly enjoyed my company.

These two suggestions should be relatively inexpensive to implement. However, I am feeling bold tonight, so here is a more ambitious one:

3) Reward long-distance and loyal travelers

From a routing perspective, long-distance travelers should represent a valuable segment. However, current pricing does not seem to incentivize this. Combined with extended travel times, this makes bus travel a difficult choice compared to flights, even for customers willing to pay a similar price. For example, a Milan–Oslo journey takes approximately 37 hours and costs around €110. You do offer discounts, but they do not seem tied to loyalty. Offering discounts based on past journeys could significantly increase retention and make people (myself included) more willing to endure long trips.

Said bluntly: we cannot live on ideals alone. Sometimes we need to be told we are good boys for taking the bus, and that we deserve a small reward.

I would like to conclude by explaining what FlixBus means to me, and why I choose it. Part of the reason is simple: I do not like flying because of its environmental impact. But over the years, our relationship has evolved. FlixBus gives me time. Time I normally don't have. I only play video games on FlixBus. I read. I listen to podcasts. I have a playlist that I only listen to while traveling on your buses.

Sometimes I write. Once, I even wrote a poem about a bus driver who was particularly funny and kind. I doubt I am the only one. Maybe this is something you could build on: sharing FlixBus stories, poems, songs, things created because of the time your journeys give back to us. Time that pretends we are being productive, but actually frees us from the shackles of performativity. Think of the community this could create, and, since the world is not made of dreams alone, the business value too.

4) Encourage and reward FlixBus art

Encourage the creation of stories, poems, and other creative outputs made possible by long journeys. Have also a reward for the best (maybe publicly voted?) creation to incentivize submission.

Turn what is currently a disadvantage — time — into a narrative advantage: a space of freedom and (almost) free, creative and meaningful advertising. A shift in perspective, if you will.

Yours truly,

Gabor Riccardi