Eurowings Look to Scandinavia
The Lufthansa Group’s budget arm Eurowings is making a play for the Swedish market as the competitive landscape continues to shift in Europe. The move realizes the German group’s long-held aim to capture a larger share of the Scandinavian market but comes as other carriers also see opportunities in the region as Norwegian Air and SAS continue to struggle.
From March, Eurowings will offer nonstop service from Stockholm’s Arlanda airport and 20 European destinations, including sun runs to Alicante, Faro and Nice, as well as more traditional destinations Berlin, Birmingham and Copenhagen. The airline will initially base 150 crew members and five Airbus A320s at Arlanda.
“We have done our homework and responded quickly to new customer needs and requests,” said Eurowings CEO Jens Bischof last week. “We are convinced we will soon also attract many Swedish vacationers and business travelers with our cutting-edge services.”
The Lufthansa Group has long had its eye on the Scandinavian market. For years, those overtures took the form of a possible acquisition of SAS and, according to reports in 2016, its integration into Eurowings. Nothing came of those plans with SAS remaining an independent carrier and fellow Star Alliance member.
The crisis, however, has driven a dramatic change in Nordic air service. Norwegian has retrenched to less than half its pre-crisis size with a focus on just its home market. And SAS has removed 30 aircraft from its fleet and accelerated the retirement of its 24 remaining Boeing 737s in favor of A320neo-family jets. These cuts at the region’s two largest carriers — plus pandemic travel restrictions — have driven a dramatic decline in available seats on flights to, from and in Swede. Schedules show them down 51 percent in September compared with 2019, and nearly 60 percent for the full year, according to Cirium data. For comparison, European seat capacity is only down 35 percent in September and nearly 48 percent for the year.
Ryanair also sees opportunities in Scandinavia. Europe’s largest carrier will open a new base at Stockholm Arlanda with initially two 737s in October. The move comes almost two years after Ryanair closed a base at Stockholm’s Skavsta’s airport due to the grounding, and resulting delivery delays, of the 737 Max. In July, CEO Michael O’Leary said the pandemic has created the largest growth opportunity in his career for the airline with Sweden one such opportunity where “both SAS and Norwegian are in chaos.”
And a day after Eurowings’ announcement, Ryanair unveiled plans for new domestic service between Stockholm and Skellefteå on the Gulf of Bothnia. Flights will begin in December.
EasyJet, which rebuffed a takeover offer from fellow discounter Wizz Air earlier in September, also has named Sweden — and Scandinavia more broadly — as a place where it plans to invest in a “network of key cities,” including opening new bases.
Eurowings, like every carrier in Europe, has its work cut out for it. But the airline is ahead of other Lufthansa Group airlines in restructuring and, as a result, is recovering quickly. In August, group CEO Carsten Spohr said Eurowings is already hiring staff again and is likely to recover to — and expand beyond — its pre-crisis fleet ahead of other group airlines.
“Eurowings has a pan-European ambition,” Bischof said in March. Stockholm is Eurowing’s second base towards this goal since the crisis began; the first is one in Prague that opens in October.
Route Briefs
- West Palm Beach is Avelo Airlines‘ fifth destination from its new New Haven, Connecticut, base. The carrier will connect the cities from December, a month after it first lands at the coastal Connecticut airport.
- British Airways is hinting that it expects strong leisure travel demand next summer. The airline will connect two destinations in the Azores — Ponta Delgada and Terceira — to its London Heathrow hub seasonally from July through September 2022. Both Azorean island destinations are served by Ryanair from London Stansted, Cirium schedules show.
- Budget carriers aren’t the only ones with eyes on Stockholm. Finnair is expanding its new longhaul base at Arlanda with new nonstops to Los Angeles from November, and New York JFK from December. The routes complement previously announced routes between Stockholm and Bangkok, Miami and Phuket that begin this fall. The additions fill what Finnair sees as a gap in the Swedish market following cuts at Norwegian and SAS.
- Latam Airlines Group, citing efficiencies gained through its U.S. Chapter 11 restructuring, is doubling down on Brazil amid overtures from Azul to acquire its Brazilian subsidiary. In the first quarter of 2022, Latam will add seven new domestic points to its map: São Paulo Guarulhos to Bauru, Cascavel, Caxias do Sul, Juiz de Fora and Presidente Prudente; Brasilia to Sinop; and Recife to Fernando de Noronha. The airline plans to serve 56 airports in Brazil by end-March, or 30 percent more than two years earlier. And if that was not enough, Latam could add up to another 10 new destinations plus 30 more new routes in 2022.
And to the south, Latam is looking to return to Buenos Aires’ Aeroparque airport and Mendoza in Argentina. The airline is seeking authority to serve Aeroparque from Lima, Santiago and São Paulo Guraulhos, and Mendoza from Santiago and São Paulo beginning in October. Latam ceased operations at the close-in Buenos Aires airport when it shut its Latam Airlines Argentina subsidiary in 2020; Mendoza flights were suspended due to the Covid-19 pandemic the same year. - Austin is ground zero for one of the hottest competitive fights in the U.S. today. The airport’s largest carrier, Southwest Airlines, is adding fuel to the fire with six new routes between the Texas capital and Amarillo, Charleston, Columbus, Midland/Odessa, Puerto Vallarta, and Ontario from March 2022. The additions follow a similar build up by American Airlines, as well as smaller expansions by other carriers. Outside of Austin, Southwest will add two more new routes: Albuquerque to Burbank from January, and Denver to Cozumel from March.
- WestJet‘s budget arm Swoop is doubling down on sun runs this winter. Beginning in November and December, the carrier will connect Edmonton and Los Cabos; Toronto and both Kingston and Los Cabos; and Winnipeg and Orlando Sanford. The routes follow the easing of re-entry restrictions for Canadians traveling internationally.
- Speaking of European leisure travel, Transavia France will connect Paris Orly to Cabo Verde this winter. The Air France-KLM budget arm will fly the route from December through March, and compete with Cabo Verde Airlines.
- U.S. airlines with sought-after international air service rights can breathe a sigh of relief and wait a little bit longer before they need to resume flights. The Department of Transportation has extended a startup and dormancy waiver to March 26, 2022, from October 30. Without a waiver, carriers’ holding these rights must operate them within 90 days of the deadline or risk losing them. Flights to China, Cuba and Tokyo’s Haneda Airport are all covered by the waiver.
Separately, the DOT will award 16 peak afternoon and evening “runway timings” — in other words slot pairs — at Newark Liberty International Airport to a single low-cost carrier. The move follows a successful lawsuit by Spirit Airlines to release the slots that were previously held by Southwest. The DOT did not provide a timeline for the release though they are likely to award the slots in time for the Summer 2022 travel season.