Ninety-nine dollars isn’t enough to buy a month’s worth of rides on the New York City subway system. But it can get you a plane ticket across the Atlantic on Scandinavian carrier Norwegian Air—and that’s causing more than a little turbulence in the airline industry.
The low-cost airline, which has long connected Scandinavia with destinations across Europe, has been making inroads into the United States for several years, with direct flights from cities such as London, Paris, Copenhagen, and its home base of Oslo. But this year, after winning approval from the U.S. Department of Transportation to use an Irish subsidiary for transatlantic travel, Norwegian is launching a massive expansion. In the first quarter of 2017 alone, the carrier announced a dozen new routes from U.S. cities including Boston, Seattle, and Denver—at prices that are often less than half those of legacy airlines. By year’s end, Norwegian plans to operate nearly 100 flights weekly out of 13 American hubs. “Three or four airlines have controlled the flights [over the Atlantic],” says CEO Bjørn Kjos. “We have disrupted this monopoly [with] our low fares.”
A decade ago, Norwegian was a virtually unknown regional airline; today, it’s reinventing the industry. Transatlantic fares are just the beginning. In April, the carrier announced nonstop flights between London and Singapore for $199 each way. And one route map the company recently shared with investors shows how Norwegian hopes to one day encircle the globe. “If they execute on their plan,” says Henry Harteveldt, a travel-industry analyst for Atmosphere Research Group, “Norwegian could be the 21st-century-airline equivalent of Pan Am.”
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Norwegian isn’t the only carrier to offer budget flights across the Atlantic—Iceland’s Wow Air offers $99 fares to Europe, with a stop in Reykjavík, from 10 North American cities; Lufthansa offshoot Eurowings has plans to connect Munich to Orlando, Florida; Las Vegas; and Seattle. But Norwegian aims to beat them all in execution and scale. Like other low-cost carriers, it charges for checked bags, snacks, drinks, and blankets. But its transatlantic experience is nonetheless remarkably comfortable. The service is cheerful, the food decent, and the in-flight entertainment options robust. Each seat has its own power outlet and USB port. The planes are next-generation Boeings with quieter cabins and pressure levels designed to reduce jet lag.
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