With tickets getting pricy for Europe flights, new Iceland airline PLAY announced Wednesday it will bring budget air travel back to Orlando for crossing the Atlantic.
PLAY’s chief executive officer, Birgir Jónsson, said the airline will rely on the Airbus A320 family of aircraft, as do the budget carriers Frontier and Spirit, and will have an approach to service and fares similar to those two airlines.
“Prices are really high,” Jónsson said of Atlantic air travel. “Our competitors are basically leaving the market wide open for a low-cost carrier to come in and drive prices down.”
PLAY already is gearing up to start service in coming months from Baltimore/Washington and Boston Logan international airports and Stewart International Airport at Newburgh, New York. A quick check of prices on PLAY’s website found roundtrip flights between Baltimore/Washington and London to be priced as low as $385.
Orlando International Airport will be the airline’s fourth destination in the U.S., with flights to start this fall. PLAY’s home base in Iceland will be the hub for connections to Europe, a setup like that of Iceland’s longstanding Icelandair.
The pandemic brought an end to Orlando’s budget European air service provided by Norwegian.
PLAY is scheduling outbound flights from Orlando on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays beginning Oct. 1 and inbound flights on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays starting Sept. 30.
Orlando flights will be timed for optimal connections to Berlin, Copenhagen, Dublin, London, Paris and the Swedish city of Gothenburg. PLAY’s network will have many other stops in Europe but Orlando travelers arriving in Iceland will have to wait a day or more for connections.
Flying the nearly six hours from Orlando to Keflavík International Airport near Reykjavík, Iceland, will require an Airbus 320 with additional stamina – the long-range version of the Airbus 321neo.
The long-range version is pared down to 214 seats, a couple of dozen fewer than the conventional model, and is equipped with extra fuel capacity.
Jónsson said his three-year-old company evaluated Florida’s major airports, including at Miami, Fort Lauderdale and Tampa. A reason the airline chose Orlando was the coming passenger service by Brightline Trains between Orlando and South Florida, starting in about a year.
“I’m not going to say it’s a deciding factor but it’s a major factor,” Jónsson said. “Most people who land in Orlando from Iceland or Europe are not necessarily going to the Orlando area. They might be going anywhere in Florida actually. The option of a high-speed train is a big selling point.”
Vicki Jaramillo, senior director of marketing and air service development, at Orlando International Airport, said her staff has been promoting Brightline’s coming service to Orlando.
With tracks from Miami to Orlando, and with plans for an extension to Tampa, Brightline’s only airport stop will be in Orlando.
“When I talk to international carriers, and especially a European one, they know so much about trains and airports,” Jaramillo said. “They understand the importance of having trains.”
PLAY formed in the wake of the collapse of another Iceland airline, WOW Air, which formed in 2012 and quickly grew to a global network.
WOW began service to Orlando International Airport in December 2018, but the airline folded a few months later. Jónsson and other executives of WOW regrouped to form PLAY.
“These companies are linked in a way. There’s a shared DNA so to speak,” Jónsson said. “But underneath is the hood is a completely different animal, a completely different company.”
Jónsson said WOW “basically overreached,” growing too fast to be too big and was underfinanced for big, costly aircraft. He said PLAY will expand gradually and deliberately, with an efficient fleet of narrow-bodied planes.
With PLAY’s announcement of service from Orlando, the airline is offering introductory fares. Jónsson said more typical fares would be difficult to predict.
“The price of an airline ticket is like the Icelandic wind. It changes many times a day. Our aim is to be the lowest and most economical choice,” Jónsson said. “I don’t think we will have any problems in offering really, really competitive prices.”
With the pandemic and recession, travel from Orlando International Airport to European cities contracted significantly.
Orlando’s passenger volumes for domestic travel has rebounded to pre-pandemic levels and service to Latin America and the Caribbean also has made a strong comeback.
Jaramillo said European service is catching up. For May through August in 2019, airlines provided 528,000 seats for travel between Orlando and Europe. So far this year for the same period, airlines expect to provide 355,000 seats.
kspear@orlandosentinel.com
