Volotea opens for business!

Europe's youngest airline (Picture: Volotea)

Lots of speculation has surrounded the launch of a the new startup airline Volotea (in case you missed it, this blog was one of the first to report it back in December!) but the veil has finally been lifted...

 It's not every day that you can witness the birth of a new airline, but this is exactly what happened last Friday: Volotea is now open for business!

Volotea, taking off on 5th April (Picture: Volotea)

Volotea won't be flying until 5th April, but it is already possible to book flights on its website, which went into count-down mode last Friday before finally being unveiled (a few minutes ahead of the scheduled time actually!)

If the website is the ultimate reflection of the value of a business, Volotea's is stylish but nimble, cosmopolitan and with a touch of minimalism (its designers haven't even missed the Pinterest phenomenon)

By the way, in case you missed the news, despite being headquartered in Barcelona, Volotea is going to start with a base in Venice-Marco Polo and from there it is going to fly to 14 medium-sized cities across Europe, plus some routes that do not go through Venice (I imagine as a way to optimize its Boeing 717s rotations). It is going to offer single class seating and pricing, seems to be really competitive with the low cost carriers, although it has deliberately chosen to focus on routes that currently see little or no competition from other low cost or network carriers...this means more options for European air travellers, particularly those that do not live in big metropolitan areas, and more alternatives also for managers at secondary airports, that had become increasingly dependent on Ryanair to maintain traffic numbers up...and it looks like Venice is just the start, Volotea might be soon coming to an airport near you!