Influx of budget airlines into Finland’s airspace continues

Newcomer Norwegian to launch first flights from Helsinki to Stockholm and Oslo today

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The flood of low-fare airlines into Finland continues. Today, Thursday, the Norwegian Air Shuttle ASA, commercially branded ”Norwegian”, is to launch direct flights from Helsinki to Stockholm and Oslo.
      Norwegian will bring new competition on the Nordic routes. It will start to fly from Helsinki to Stockholm twice a day on weekdays and Sundays, and once on Saturdays. To Oslo, the carrier will have two flights on weekdays and one flight on Sundays.
     
The arrival of Norwegian in Finland reflects the fact that new players continue to be interested in busy connections between Finland and the rest of the world, while competition remains intense.
      For the time being, Norwegian is the only new airline that has announced its arrival in Finland in the current year, but five of the older carriers have reported that they will launch or have already launched new routes.
     
In addition to Norwegian, new routes will be launched by Ryanair, Wizz Air, Easyjet, Air Baltic, and Aer Lingus. The strongest airline on the move is Air Baltic, which is to launch eight routes from Finland’s provincial airports either to Tallinn or Riga.
      Kimmo Ruotsalainen, the Marketing Director at Finavia, the service company that maintains a network of 25 airports in Finland, believes that in Finland the proportion of the so-called cut-rate airlines of all outgoing and incoming scheduled flights will continue to grow steadily.
      At present, the proportion is almost exactly 10%, but the new route openings indicate that the proportion will increase distinctly in the course of the current year.
      It would come as no surprise to Ruotsalainen if the proportion of cut-rate airlines were to reach as high as 13 to 14 per cent by the end of this year.
     
Compared with other European countries, budget carriers arrived in Finland rather late. Ryanair launched its first flights from Tampere in 2003, showing slow growth in the first years.
      Over the last couple of years, the proportion of cut-rate carriers has increased briskly, and a large number of new service providers has entered the market.
      However, when it comes to scheduled flights, the share of low-cost airlines in Finland is still clearly smaller than that in other parts of Europe. In many other EU countries, the proportion of low-fare airlines in the international air traffic is already in the region of 25%.
     
The cut-rate airlines have snatched passengers from traditional national carriers, such as Finnair.
      However, Ruotsalainen points out that the arrival of low-fare airlines has not only increased competition, but it has also brought new customers to airlines, leading to a general growth in aviation.
      This is good news to Finavia and other similar aviation authorities.
      Moreover, the low-cost carriers have not only increased the number of Finns’ flights abroad but they have also brought people to Finland, which is significant for tourism.
     
The aviation sector no longer speaks only about traditional airlines and cut-rate carriers, but there is also a new category of "hybrid carriers".
      A pure low-cost carrier, such as Ryanair, uses cheaper airports, and quotes a customer just the basic rate for his or her trip, while at the same time trying to add to the price various surcharges for services rendered.
      A hybrid carrier uses the main airports, while including in the ticket price for example some meals.
      According to Ruotsalainen, typical hybrid carriers operating in Finland include Air Berlin and Air Baltic.
      The new arrival, Norwegian, is said to be closer to a true low-cost carrier than a hybrid in this respect.
     
     
Current budget airline routes to and from Finland are as follows:
      Air Baltic
       
      Vaasa–Riga
      Lappeenranta–Riga
      Rovaniemi –Tampere–Riga
      Kuusamo – Lappeenranta–Riga
      Turku–Riga
      Oulu–Riga
      Helsinki–Riga
      Oulu–Stockholm
      Tampere–Tallinn
      Oulu–Tallinn
       
      Air Berlin
       
      Helsinki–Düsseldorf
      Helsinki–Berlin
       
      Aer Lingus
       
      Helsinki–Dublin
       
      Easyjet
       
      Helsinki–Paris
      Helsinki–Manchester
      Helsinki–London (Gatwick)*
       
      Norwegian
       
      Helsinki–Oslo
      Helsinki–Stockholm
       
      Ryanair
       
      Tampere–Edinburgh
      Tampere–Malaga
      Tampere–Kaunas
      Tampere–Frankfurt
      Tampere–Milan
      Tampere–Riga
      Tampere–London (Stansted)
      Tampere–Bremen
      Lappeenranta–Düsseldorf
       
      Wizz Air
       
      Turku–Warsaw
      Turku–Riga
      Turku–Budapest
      Turku–Gdansk
      Tampere–Gdansk
     
      * Easyjet fly to Gatwick, and NOT to Stansted as we incorrectly stated. We apologise for the slip and thank an observant reader for pointing it out...


Previously in HS International Edition:
  Cut-rate airline Norwegian to launch flights from Helsinki to Stockholm and Oslo (12.2.2010)

Links:
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