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| Founded | 1997 (1997) (as a division ofEurowings) | ||||||
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| Commenced operations | 2002 (2002) (spin-off from Eurowings) | ||||||
| Ceased operations | 7 April 2020 (2020-04-07)[1] | ||||||
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| Fleet size | 33 | ||||||
| Parent company | Lufthansa Group | ||||||
| Headquarters | Cologne,North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany | ||||||
| Key people | Executive Board:
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| Website | www | ||||||
GermanwingsGmbH was[1] a Germanlow-cost airline wholly owned byLufthansa[2] which operated under theEurowings brand. It was based inCologne withhubs atCologne Bonn Airport,Stuttgart Airport,Hamburg Airport,Berlin Tegel Airport, andMunich Airport; and further bases atHannover Airport andDortmund Airport.[3]
Germanwings operated independently as Lufthansa's low-cost carrier until October 2015, when Lufthansa decided to fully transfer the brand identity of its low cost short haul-product to Eurowings. After 2016, Germanwings operated as awet lease operator for its sister companyEurowings, with the Germanwings branding being phased out. The IATA code4U continued to operate under the Eurowings brand until March 2018, when it was abandoned and replaced with the Eurowings designatorEW.[4] Germanwings was closed and merged back into Eurowings in April 2020 as part of a broad restructuring during theCOVID-19 pandemic.[1]
In 1997,Eurowings set up a low-cost department, which became a separate company under the nameGermanwings on 27 October 2002. On 7 December 2005, the airline signed an agreement to purchase 18Airbus A319-100 aircraft with a further 12options, with deliveries scheduled from July 2006 until 2008.[5]
During winter 2004–05, Germanwings leased twoBoeing 717-200s fromAerolíneas de Baleares to test the aircraft type, but no purchase order was made afterwards.
In 2008, initial plans were made to merge Germanwings,Eurowings andTUIfly into one airline to compete withAir Berlin and its subsidiaryLTU in the German market and witheasyJet andRyanair on international routes. However, these plans were never realized. Instead, Germanwings became a wholly owned subsidiary ofLufthansa on 1 January 2009.[6]
In 2012, Lufthansa announced its plans to transfer point-to-point shorthaul flights operating from cities other than Frankfurt and Munich from Lufthansa to Germanwings.[7][8] Therefore, the company received a revised corporate design. These transfers were made between spring 2013 and autumn 2014;Düsseldorf Airport was the last base transferred from March 2014.
As part of the 2013 restructuring and relaunch of Germanwings, around 30 Lufthansa aircraft were to be added to Germanwings' fleet of 33 aircraft.[9] Additionally, the 23 aircraft currently operated by Eurowings for Lufthansa flights not flying out of Frankfurt and Munich were to join Germanwings. The new Germanwings was to operate around 90 aircraft.
The airline had a long-standing dispute with the Vereinigung Cockpit union, which demanded a plan in which pilots can retire at the age of 55 and retain 60% of their pay, which parent Lufthansa insists was not affordable. Germanwings pilots staged a nationwide strike in support of their demands in April 2014, which lasted 3 days. The pilots staged a six-hour strike in September 2014. Simultaneous strikes were staged by Lufthansa pilots.[10]
By the end of 2014, all of Lufthansa's national routes and international traffic to and from Germany, except flights to and from Frankfurt and Munich and the routes from Düsseldorf to Newark and Chicago,[11] were transferred to Germanwings.[12] The last route to be transferred was Düsseldorf–Zurich on 8 January 2015.[11][13]
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In January 2015, Lufthansa Group announced that it would discontinue theGermanwings brand and replace it withEurowings starting in late 2015.[14]
On 25 October 2015, Eurowings took over 55 routes previously operated under the Germanwings brand.[15][16] The first Germanwings bases to be mostly taken over by Eurowings wereDüsseldorf Airport,Hamburg Airport - at both of which Eurowings already operated on behalf of Germanwings - andCologne Bonn Airport.
Lufthansa announced in October 2015 that Germanwings' own website would be dissolved and redirected to Eurowings by January 2016 as part of their merger. However, Germanwings continued to operate as a company.[17] From that date, Eurowings became solely responsible for all sales under the Germanwings brand.[18] In January 2016, Germanwings' social media profiles, such as those onFacebook andYouTube, were renamed Eurowings, whilegermanwings.com was redirected toeurowings.com. However, Germanwings continued to operate under its own flight numbers, but used the Eurowings brand.
In December 2016, it was announced that Germanwings would retire 20 aircraft during 2017 without replacement due to Lufthansa's new wet-lease deal withAir Berlin which also provided services forEurowings. It was reported that the Air Berlin aircraft were newer and cheaper to operate than those of Germanwings.[19]
In August 2017, it was announced that Germanwings would abandon its ownIATA code4U by 25 March 2018. Since then, it has used Eurowings'EW code on for all operations, which are already carried out under the Eurowings brand.[4]
In October 2019, thePristina base, which had been operated by Germanwings since June 2019, was transferred toEurowings Europe.[20] In return, Germanwings took over the German base inMunich which had been operated by its sister airline.[21]
On 7 April 2020, Lufthansa announced that it would be shutting down Germanwings, partly due to the large travel ban during theCOVID-19 pandemic.[1][22]
Germanwings had offered three fare types since 2013.Basic was no-frills and offered no inclusive catering and only hand luggage.Best included hold baggage, inclusive snacks and drinks as well as access to some lounges for tier members of Miles&More.[23]Smart andBest more or less corresponded to the Lufthansa service offered on the routes taken over by Germanwings. The fleet was only equipped witheconomy class.
Germanwings offeredSky Bistro (Bord Shop in German), abuy on board food and drinks programme.[24] The airline provided an inflight magazine, a bi-monthly German and English magazine calledGW. While the primary editorial focus was rooted in Germanwings destinations, the content was not exclusively about travel.[25]
Germanwings booking service providedBlind Booking, a unique option that allowed passengers to choose one of Germanwings' base airports, select a category of destination (e.g. Party, Gay-friendly or Culture) and then purchase a round-trip ticket via a random lottery process from among the cities in the category. Such tickets were often priced lower than the corresponding ticket to the same destination, and Germanwings e-mails its customers with details of their destination shortly after the purchase.[26]
Germanwings had been wholly owned by Lufthansa since 1 January 2009; formal reporting since then had been within the Group Accounts. From 2012, Germanwings figures had been reported only within the 'Lufthansa Passenger Airline Group', and have not generally been available separately. The key known trends for Germanwings are shown below (as at year ending 31 December):
| 2008 | 2009 | 2010 | 2011 | 2012 | 2013 | 2014 | 2015 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Turnover (€m) | 628 | 580 | 630 | 687 | n/a | n/a | Separate data no longer available | |
| Profits (EBITDA) (€m) | 39 | 63 | −9 | −15 | n/a | n/a | ||
| Number of employees (at year end) | 1,046 | 1,111 | 1,272 | 1,274 | 1,352 | 2,073 | ||
| Number of passengers (m) | 7.6 | 7.2 | 7.7 | 7.5 | 7.8 | 16 | ||
| Passenger load factor (%) | n/a | n/a | 77.2 | 78.2 | n/a | n/a | ||
| Number of aircraft (at year end) | 25 | 26 | 30 | 30 | 32 | 67 | 84 | 62 |
| Notes/sources | [27][28] | [28] | [29] | [30][31] | [32][33][34] | [35] | [36][37] | |
In line with Lufthansa's declared business strategy, the transfer of European non-hub traffic from Lufthansa Passenger Airlines to Germanwings continued in 2014 and was completed successfully on 7 January 2015.[38] (The increase in 2013 and 2014 figures was due to this intervening transfer of aircraft and routes from Lufthansa.)
Germanwings served more than 130 destinations across Europe.[39]
Germanwings hadcodeshare agreements with the following airlines:[40]
Germanwings operated the following aircraft:[citation needed]
| Aircraft | Total | Introduced | Retired | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Airbus A319-100 | 50 | 2002 | 2020 | Operated forEurowings between 2015 and 2020 |
| Airbus A320-200 | 26 | 2003 | 2019 | |
| Boeing 717-200 | 2 | 2004 | 2005 | Leased fromAerolíneas de Baleares |
| McDonnell Douglas MD-81 | 1 | 2007 | 2007 | Leased fromNordic Airways |
| McDonnell Douglas MD-82 | 1 | 2007 | 2007 | Leased fromFlyNordic |
| McDonnell Douglas MD-83 | 1 | 2007 | 2007 | Leased fromNordic Airways |
Germanwings used several different special liveries. Some aircraft had specialliveries promoting German cities (e.g. theBearbus paint scheme inspired by thecoat of arms of Berlin), or as advertisements (e.g. a pink livery forT-Mobile).[41] Those were abandoned during the 2013 rebranding.
Media related toGermanwings at Wikimedia Commons
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