Color Air

Color Air was the first Norwegian low-cost airline based in Oslo and based on the Oslo Airport Gardermoen. She was a sister company of the Color Line and existed only for 1998 to 1999.

History

Color Air was founded by the owner of the Color Line, Nils Olav Sunde and should first carry out shuttle flights for their ferry services between Ålesund and Oslo. The first flight took place on 6 September 1998, a Boeing 737-300 between these two cities instead, where a few weeks before its closure was used the Oslo Airport, Fornebu in Oslo.

Prior to 1994, the Norwegian domestic flights market was regulated by the state. An agreement to split since 1952 to the route from Oslo to Bergen exclusive SAS Scandinavian Airlines, while the former Braathens SAFE from Oslo to Stavanger, Trondheim and Ålesund flew. In 1994, the market was finally opened up to competition and there was a fierce competition on most of these connections between the two companies ( the Braathens in 2002 with the acquisition by SAS eventually lost ). Only from Oslo to Ålesund Braathens first flew more exclusive.

On 8 October 1998, the new Oslo-Gardermoen airport was opened, replacing the previous congested Oslo Airport Fornebu. Thus, the bottleneck of the Norwegian aviation was eliminated and Color Air used the new capacity to come up with now three Boeing 737-300 also domestic flights to Bergen, Stavanger and Trondheim offer. SAS Braathens and countered this new competition with a compression to their schedules on those routes, and partly it was a day and city together more than 50 connections which brought them into the top 10 European domestic routes with the highest offer of transport. In addition, SAS now flew to Ålesund.

Due to the competition and the low rate of prices Color Air, which were made possible by a no frills approach, also kindled a price war between the three airlines. Color Line was not able yet to establish itself as the market leader, including the absence of a concept for customer loyalty - it was, for example, no frequent flyer program offered. SAS Braathens and had, however, at this time a strong financial background ( SAS through the profitable traffic in Denmark and Sweden, Braathens by the former shareholder KLM ) and could afford to lose money in this price war.

As a result of this competitive situation Color Air was on 1 October 1999, only one year after its operations, in bankruptcy and was eventually dissolved. It is estimated that in its 13 months of operation resulted in a loss of about half a billion NOK.

Destinations

Color Air flew from their home base, Oslo Airport Gardermoen, from domestic to Bergen, Stavanger, Trondheim and Ålesund and international London - Stansted and Alicante.

Fleet

The fleet of Air Color comprised during its existence three aircraft:

• 3 Boeing 737-300 (2 returned to ILFC, 1 sold to bmi)