New Vueling carried more than 40,000 passengers on its first day of operations

Friday 10th July, 2009

Vueling and clickair integrated their operations at one minute past midnight on July 9th 2009. This step integrated timetables, services and sales channels, in what constituted the most important step of the integration process.

In the UK, Vueling will operate daily services from London Heathrow to Bilbao, La Coruna and Seville and will continue to operate seasonal summer flights to Vigo. Vueling’s first flights into London Heathrow arrived at Terminal 3 yesterday afternoon from La Coruna and Vigo. (See photo attached). The new telephone number for reservations in the UK is 0906 754 7541 – open 0800 hours to midnight.

New Vueling’s first three flights, departed simultaneously at five minutes past midnight on the 9th, linking Barcelona to Moscow, Palermo and Verona, a set of routes that were previously operated by clickair. Along with the integration, Vueling moved operations to terminal 2B at Barcelona airport, in a preliminary step to the definitive move to the brand-new T1 terminal, which will take place in September.

263 flights and 40,000 passengers on the first day of operations

On the first day of joint operations, new Vueling operated 263 flights on 71 routes. From Barcelona it operated 160 flights on 26 routes, while 103 flights on 45 routes will operated from the remaining bases: 34 flights in Seville, 30 in Madrid, 14 in Malaga, 10 in Ibiza, eight in Bilbao, and seven in Valencia. New Vueling carried 40,000 passengers on its first day of operations, 70% of which originated from Barcelona airport.

Sales channels integration

Both companies’ sales channels, direct and indirect, have been integrated: overnight from the 8th to the 9th of July and clickair’s website is forwarding its traffic to www.vueling.com.

New Vueling now code-shares with Iberia and only overlapping routes are not subject to this agreement.

However, Vueling will continue operating its own independent sales force, available through travel agents and corporate accounts via IATA’s code VY. The sales increase in this channel has been one of the most remarkable milestones in the company’s improvement plan, to the point that GDS sales now represent more than 20% of Vueling’s ticket revenue. In the Spanish market, Vueling is now the country’s second airline, after Iberia, with a 6.8% market share.
New Vueling
In the Spanish market, Vueling is now the country’s second airline, after Iberia, with a 6.8% market share.

New Vueling, the product of integrating Vueling and Clickair, operates a 35 all-Airbus A320 fleet, flying 92 routes to 45 airports in 17 countries in Europe and North of Africa.

The main shareholders are Iberia, with a 45.85% share, Inversiones Hemisferio, with 14.3%, Nefinsa, 4.15%. Free float will be around 35%.

Josep Piqué will remain as Vueling’s Chairman, while Alex Cruz, clickair’s CEO, has the same function in the newly-merged company.