Photo by Alec Wilson

The folk at Monarch Airlines have been busy this week with the announcement that it is putting its wings firmly in the scheduled low-cost flights market. And with that comes a few big changes…

A fond farewell to chartered services

Having started out all the way back in 1968 with a chartered flight to Madrid, Monarch expanded their chartered services to far flung and fabulous destinations such as Goa, Florida, the Caribbean and the Gambia. However, its chartered days are numbered. And that’s not all either – Monarch are planning further changes to streamline their services. 

A more streamlined Monarch Airlines

As well as ditching its chartered flights by April 2015, the airline also plan to cut 1,000 jobs, lose their East Midlands base by the end of April 2015 and reduce their fleet from 42 to 30 aircraft. I think it’s fair to call that a more streamlined Monarch. As a purely low-cost airline, Monarch is set to compete more directly with the likes of Ryanair and easyJet as well as smaller low-cost airlines such as Norwegian and Vueling.

Monarch’s management will no doubt hope that the new changes will revitalise the airline’s fortunes as well as attract further investment. In today’s world, their decision to move away from chartered services is probably no big surprise. With so many people clued up on the world wide web and so many different options to plan and book a holiday, there is just not as big a market for the all-inclusive holidays that helped put Monarch in the air. 

Praia de Benagil in the Algarve

It’s not quite all change at Monarch Airlines. They will continue to fly to popular sunshine and winter destinations like the glorious Algarve. They will also continue to fly from other UK bases including Birmingham Airport, Manchester Airport, London Luton Airport, London Gatwick Airport and Leeds Bradford Airport.

It’s also not all bad news for those of you who have enjoyed their chartered flights… As part of the airline’s ongoing strategic review, further decisions will be made about which – if any – of their current chartered services will be added to their scheduled services. The path to all-scheduled services will also mean some brand spanking new planes with an order placed for 30 Boeing 737 MAX 8s that are expected to enter service in 2018.

Monarch only moved into East Midlands Airport in 2012 when it took up slots left open by the demise of bmi baby. We’ll have to wait and see if another airline takes the slots that will be opened once Monarch leave… 

On the changes, Andrew Swaffield, chief executive of the Monarch Group, said: “As holiday habits change, our customers want a greater choice of flight times and destinations – particularly for short breaks. As we evolve from our roots in charter flying to become a scheduled European low-cost carrier we are becoming more focussed in the services we offer which we believe will provide customers overall with a more attractive flying schedule in the future.”

You can read the full statement on their website: www.monarch.co.uk