How Loganair continued to grow during the current crisis

For any airline to launch new routes in the current economic climate takes some self-assurance. Among all the business sectors affected by the 
coronavirus pandemic, civil aviation has been hit conspicuously hard with – until recently – the vast majority of flights cancelled and airports all but closed.

Loganair, the UK’s largest regional airline, is based at Glasgow Airport and has been on an upward trajectory since launching with one Piper Aztec plane in 1962.

It has navigated previous turbulent times which gives it the advantage of longevity but Kay Ryan, the company’s chief commercial officer, says longevity alone is no guarantee of survival. The experience gained from almost six decades of commercial flight is a distinct advantage, however.

Loganair’s chief commercial officer Kay Ryan

As is the fact, she adds, that the airline is tightly focused on sustainable growth. “Critical to our continued success is that we’ve refrained from over-expansion and concentrated on growing within our operational and financial means,” says Ryan.

Pursuing that strategy, in March the airline announced plans to take on 16 routes previously operated by the newly-grounded Flybe from Loganair’s own base airports at Aberdeen, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Inverness and Newcastle.

“We decided very quickly to start selling these flights, several of which fitted well with the expansion of our Scottish connectivity and took that south of the Border, slightly further afield but without going into unfamiliar markets,” she says.

Despite the very challenging conditions, she adds: “You have to be quick to market – you can’t let routes go cold and the response has to be immediate.”

Unsurprisingly, launching routes has inevitably been delayed but the programme is now well under way, with flights on sale for Loganair’s new routes from Dundee to London City and Dundee to George Best Belfast City airport joining others that include Edinburgh to Exeter, Aberdeen to Manchester, and Aberdeen to Birmingham.

The new schedule also adds a Belfast City to Glasgow service, providing crucial connectivity for business and leisure passengers with twice-daily Monday-to-Friday and Sunday flights, and a single flight on Saturdays as well as five flights per week between Aberdeen and Belfast.

None of these plans, Ryan concedes, have been helped by recent, exceptional circumstances. “People are currently booking flights very, very late to their travel date which makes predicting what the following month will look like in terms of resource or schedule quite challenging,” she says.

Ryan adds that while coronavirus meant putting some of Loganair’s plans on hold, the airline nonetheless continued to operate a restricted schedule throughout May and June – unlike most airlines which weren’t flying at all.

“We’ve maintained our City of Derry to Stansted service throughout the pandemic and never stopped flying that route as a Public Service Obligation (PSO) supported by the Northern Ireland Assembly,” she notes. “This is an important link, one that has been consistent in terms of passenger growth and it continues to give us confidence in the Northern Irish market.” 

Among routes beginning or relaunching for summer 2021 are flights to Exeter, Newquay in Cornwall and Bergen in Norway while Loganair continues with its codeshare partnerships with Air France, BA, Emirates, KLM and Turkish Airlines. It has also formed an extensive partnership with Blue Islands, the growing Channel-Islands based airline with a range of regional air connections across the UK, the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man.

Again, connectivity is key. “While we might be operating flights from Aberdeen to Manchester, many of our customers will connect directly from Aberdeen from the Northern Isles or to Manchester and beyond.

“And we provide that at affordable prices and in a way that customers respond to, with luggage included. They know that there are no hidden costs and we’ve no intention of changing that while Clan Loganair, our frequent flyer programme, is very simple to use and it doesn’t take much to earn a reward flight.

Meanwhile, Loganair is noted for lifeline services such its Orkney Inter-island routes, which include flights from Kirkwall to the Northern Isles and includes – at just one-and-a-half minutes long – the world’s shortest scheduled flight between Westray and Papa Westray.

With routes such as these, she says, the airline has in some cases “a moral obligation to continue flying”. Loganair supported the Scottish Ambulance Service quickly after the Covid outbreak and converted two planes into air ambulances, a Twin Otter and a larger Saab 340 that can carry two EpiShuttle isolation pods and a medical team.

Meanwhile, Loganair was at the forefront of recognising the importance of keeping passengers informed about the vital measures it was taking to keep them safe. “We issued a ‘simple steps to healthy flying’ video on our website explaining what customers can expect from us and what we can expect from them,” says Ryan.

“It’s extremely important that our customers have as much confidence in flying as we can possibly give them and we were among the first in the UK to give out face masks and antiviral wipes before it became mandatory and we did it from the outset, including on our Stansted route which is obviously a busy one.

“With direction from central government not clear at the time it was up to us to be proactive about what should or shouldn’t be done. We couldn’t wait for that 
information and neither could our customers so by the time these measures became mandatory we were already implementing them.

“And, unlike some other airlines, we haven’t shut the doors or switched off the lights at any time.”