Go Fly

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Go Fly was the name of a British airline, trading as "Go", now merged with easyJet.

In November 1997, British Airways announced that under the project name of Operation Blue Sky, it was to launch its own low cost airline. To be run separately from British Airways as a wholly owned subsidiary, the airline would compete in the European low-cost market, dominated by Ryanair, easyJet and Debonair.

The company was named Go Fly in February 1998. Chief Executive, Barbara Cassani said that like the airline, the name was “short, sweet and straight forward.”

Cassani had been the BA General Manager in New York and had been credited with turning around the airline's flagging fortunes on the transatlantic market in the early 1990s. She was chosen by the BA chairman, Bob Ayling, to set up the new venture. The fleet consisted of Boeing 737s. Its main base was at Stansted Airport in Essex, England.

Go started to take bookings on its website www.go-fly.com and by phone. On May 22nd 1998, Go flew for the first time - from its base at London Stansted to Rome Ciampino.

With the aim of giving more people the chance to fly to more places more often, Go positioned itself ahead of the other low cost carriers. It increased the demand to travel and challenged attitudes towards 'no frills'; this was helped in the early years with the advertising tagline "The Low Cost Airline From British Airways", something which did however provoke anger from other low cost carriers, principally easyJet and Ryanair.

While those operations had to be built up from scratch, Go had benefited from the expertise of BA. A concern was that the British airline would use its financial might to run Go at a loss so as to bankrupt the low-cost competition. In the end however the BA connection brought respectability to a sector of the market which had hitherto been viewed with scepticism from the flying public. Go was often referred to as "the low-cost airline for the middle classes".

[edit] Awards

• Chartered Institute of Marketing Effectiveness Awards - Leisure Category 1999
• Marketing Society - New Brand of the Year 2000
• Periodical Publishing Awards - Customer Magazine of the Year 2000
• Telegraph Travel Awards - Best Low Cost Airline 2001
• Business Traveller Awards - Best Low Cost Airline 2001
• The Guardian and Observer Travel Awards - Best Low Cost Airline 2002
• Business Superbrand 2002

[edit] GO is sold

After returning a profit within 2 years, the incoming BA chairman Rod Eddington decided that Go had become a liability for BA, since it was cannibalising the airline's core business. In the aftermath of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, it was clear that BA's priority had to be in restructuring its own full-service operations. In November 2000, British Airways said that Go “simply does not fit in with our full-service strategy” and that it would sell Go, valuing it at £100 million.

In March 2001, British Airways gave private equity firm 3i negotiating rights to buy Go and on June 14th 2001 the deal was sealed. 3i owned 43%, with Go’s Management team, the City and Go people owning the rest; Barbara Cassani said, “Our people deserve the credit for Go’s success and that is why I want them to become co-owners of the airline.”

On May 16th 2002, easyJet made an announcement that it was to buy Go for £374 million to expand its own operations. By December 2002, easyJet and Go operated under one Air Operators Certificate (AOC) and in April 2003 the airlines operated as one, fully under the easyJet brand.

In November 2003, Barbara Cassani published a book titled - Go, An Airline Adventure.

[edit] Go in Hawai'i

go! is also the name of a discount airline providing interisland flights in the state of Hawai'i, and is operated by Mesa Airlines.