After deciding we’d visit Venice before my daughter started back to school, my wife decided that we ought to travel to the South of France next. After all, they’re pretty close!
But only one airline with a published schedule flies Venice – Nice, and only two days a week. That’s why I wound up flying Volotea, and it was the segment I was most excited about on this trip – a new airline, with an interesting business model!
I didn’t fancy the idea of a nine hour trip by train, and there are only two flights a week making the 282-mile journey. In-season European low cost carrier Volotea offers the trip on Thursdays and Sundays. (EasyJet takes over the route come September.) The seats were just €41.12. Everything else is optional fees (Ancillaries like seats, bags, ticket flexibility and pets drive over 40% of revenue at the airline).
I absolutely love an airline that knows who they are and knows what business they are in. Volotea is a low cost carrier. They are in the business of merchandising. They are aggressive about selling subscriptions. They are aggressive about sales, period, and that leads them to offer value in exchange. They’ll sell you a (pretty good) hot meal on a sub-300 mile flight.
Volotea started flying in April 2012. They operate 44 Airbus narrowbody planes across 110 airports and 450 routes. And they’re highly profitable with an 18% EBITDA margin.
They operate point-to-point connecting small and medium markets, avoiding major hubs and direct competiton with EasyJet, Ryanair, and Wizz Air.
- 70% of demand is leisure, peaking in summer. They match capacity to demand and keep winters profitable by pruning the schedule and leasing out spare aircraft and operating subsidized service. They deliberately capped growth this year due to high aircraft lease costs, and added wet leases for peak summer flying.
- They run multi‑base, quick‑turn operations. Their 22 small bases allow aircraft to start and end their day “at home” reducing positioning costs and overnight expenses.
- They add aggressive subscroption marketing onto their classic low cost carrier model. The Megavolotea club subcription offers discounts, free carry-on bag, and lower fees for extras. It’s an annual price, with autorenewal unless cancelled.
I actually sprung for Megavolotea Plus which runs €139.99 per year after a 15‑day free trial. You need it during booking and during travel to take advantage of all of its benefits so I didn’t just take the trial and cancel within 15 days. Instead, I worked out that across five seats and taking advantage of all the extras we’d need it was a pretty good deal – and I’d cancel after the flight.
- Flight discounts Up to €20 off every Volotea flight booked while a member (applies to each passenger on the same booking)
- Priority boarding + 10 kg cabin bag Board first, and bring a standard carry-on plus small personal item. They market that boarding first guarantees overhead bin space, but charging for carry-ons makes this largely a non-issue anyway.
- Seat discount 50% off pre‑reserved seats (standard, front row, extra‑legroom)
- Checked bag discount Up to 25 % off prepaid checked bag fees
- Unlimited free changes date/route changes for no fee up to 7 days prior to departure for just the fare difference
- Birthday credit €35 Volotea travel credit sent on your birthday – activate within 15 days, and use within 7 days of activation
- Companion benefits discounts apply to all passengers on the same PNR
Auto‑renewal needs to be disabled prior to the end of each year to avoid the next year’s charge. This is strong value for families and leisure travelers flying Volotea multiple times a year – but it maths for a group on a single trip paying for checked bags and seats and taking the flight discount even on the first booking.
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Volotea check-in opened two hours prior to departure, and we’d arrived 5 minutes before that. Staff were at the counter but not helping passengers until the assigned minute had arrived. We queued up behind a couple of passengers and were helped quickly.
Since bags were prepaid, and seats already assigned, the process was quick. Bear in mind that Volotea charges extra to print your boarding passes at the airport, so you want to do that yourself in advance.
Once bags were dropped we proceeded through security – there was a priority queue with no line for Amex Platinum and Mastercard cardholders. Surely some of the passengers in the regular security queue had a Mastercard, even though this is Europe?
And since this was a Schengen flight there was no passport control to deal with.
Once through we headed to the nearby Marco Polo lounge one level above the concourse (just past the duty free chute) and I’ll write about that separately. Like many European airports, the boarding gate isn’t announced until 20 minutes prior to scheduled boarding. That way they keep you from anchoring to your gate, more likely to shop and spend in the terminal. There was a departures board in the lounge, so it was easy to keep track of.
Then we headed down to our gate – boarding passes were checked, including for whether we had the right to bring a carry-on bag on the plane. Then we headed out to the bus.
After a long tour of the airport that felt like we were driving as long as we’d be flying (it was a short flight!) we arrived at the aircraft. They were boarding from stairs at both the front and back of the aircraft, to promote quick turns.
The flight wound up completely full. I did want the extra legroom of the bulkhead row, but opted against it because of lack of underseat storage (and having things at one’s fingertips can be helpful traveling with a one year old).
Seating was tight, but honestly fine for a one hour hop.
Menus for the flight were available, and honestly they were really impressive. I’d absolutely love it if American Airlines adopted their food for sale program. They even had hot items for purchase on this flight, and boy it’s convenient. It’s also a much better deal than American’s buy onboard – they get $16 for a cold sandwich, while Volotea gets 8.5 euros for a pasta or butter chicken dish. And Volotea’s food is better, too!
My son and daughter shared a pasta. It was..fine. But the butter chicken was outstanding. I wouldn’t say the rice was very good, but the chicken and sauce were quite a surprise on the upside. I had to buy it just for the novelty.
By the time we’d been served and eaten we were well into our descent. Though crew had already come around collecting trash, they told us no rush and to go ahead and finish our meal. Eveyone was friendly and helpful.
Deplaning was quick from row two, and straight onto a jetbridge. We were quickly at baggage claim. Baggage delivery wasn’t fast, but we were soon on our way.
Overall I’d gladly fly Volotea again. The staff were great. Overall value was fantastic. And they serve routes that connect cities no one else does. And I had lounge access thanks to Priority Pass.
Volotea is actually a Spanish and not Italian low cost airline. It may appear to be Italian due to extensive network to, from, and within Italy.
I will be flying then on Tuesday and again on the 20th. Naples – Split – Lyon. All with my Cavalier king charles spaniel.
Flying them
Nice post, Gary! And since this flight originated in the Italy (EU), if there was a significant delay or cancellation, in addition to a refund, or rebooking, you would be eligible for EU261 compensation (like several hundred dollars worth). But, but… the fare was about $50, how can that be?! It be, fellas, it be… and we could legislate similar air passenger rights protections here, too, so that you get paid a baseline of compensation when the airlines make mistakes within their control like staffing and maintenance issues. Clearly, it doesn’t raise prices on consumers and airlines don’t go bankrupt. While it’s unlikely this Congress will do anything beneficial for laypersons, when the adults are back in-charge, they really should get on this. We deserve better in the USA.
Guy in your main pic must really appreciate being frozen in time with his absolute worst look!
Nice review!
Maybe next you should try airBaltic if your way leads to Nordics next time. They are niche airline offering around 100 routes from thier 4 hubs and have amazing onboard product ( free wifi, 100 items big pre order menu, Full bussines class up front etc)
Plus you can fly on A220 which is pleasure itself hahah
this is the type of article that made me read gary in the first place
more like this, sir
@1990 fantastic point on 261
i will NEVER fly any carrier in the us that flies less than 2x daily to any destination, much less 2x weekly
but this article plus the 261 shoutout puts volotea on the map precisely for the reason gary chose them: he needed VCE-NCE by air
this level of reliability and value opens up all kinds of interesting itineraries
want to check out the guggenheim in bilbao on the way to or from florence?
volotea dot com / en / destinations /
remove the spaces
@hagbard celine — Thank you. In addition to EU261, UK261 and Canada’s APPR are other similar regulations that provide support for affected passengers. Ultimately, those rules create good incentives for airlines to operate more timely and reliably.
@ThotLeader — Be gone, thot!
Great report and definitely puts this option on my radar as I’m looking at possible routes for 5 next summer.
I wouldn’t hestitate to take a 9 hour train ride over even the shortest flight in Europe. But, this routing requires at least 3 train changes. I wouldn’t take what is actually a 12-hour trip (based on random date checks) with 3 changes. And, doing it with kids sounds very unappealing. Still, I’ve never taken an intra-European flight not part of connection to/from the US. Every time, the train schedule is better. Plus, with great frequency, the low cost carriers offer few flights and lousy timing. Who wants to get up a 5 am to arrive at the destination hotel 5 hours before the room is ready?
That guy in the red hat, lol.
my list of unlikely airline delights is topped by the Croque Monsieur on EasyJet. It’s around 6 euros and is one of the finest meals in the air. My daughter and I eat 5-10 of them per year. I hope the butter chicken tastes better than it looks because it looks like a BA business class meal which is an insult.
Like @Matthew I’m impressed with the zombie – I mean guy in the purple hat.
@1990:
What can I say. We retired in Malta six years ago, and I still get my laughs reading about the doings of U.S. based airlines. Don’t get me wrong. EU based airlines are subject to similar acts of stupidity as in the States. The difference is that the EU has few hesitations about calling them out. Yes, you will never catch me on Ryan or Wizz.
But, here is my scorecard from flying LH on about 12-15 flights per year( thankfully retired now. I used to fly about 200,000 miles a year in States (EAL, CO, UAL). Retired with Lifetime Premier 1K.
So, with all these LH flights, none was ever cancelled. One time our bags didn’t connect on HEL-FRA-MLA trip. We got text message before the plane took off in FRA telling us that bags didn’t make connection, but don’t worry they will be delivered to your home this evening.
The planes were ALWAYS CLEANED after every flight. The FA’s were always friendly. If sometimes they seemed off, they didn’t take it out on passengers. We fly in Biz because we choose to. Every flight had meal service in biz. A two hour flight will get you a full three course hot meal. And tasty, too. In economy they served food as explained on his flight from Venice to Nice. Not free in Coach, but tasty.
The only flight we had cancelled was on Finnair from HEL to BGO. Flight was cancelled 30 minutes before take off. The plane was cancelled was still on ground in Bergen. But didn’t tell us until it was too late to get re-routed(Hurtigruten Coastal Express ship left Bergen late afternoon. Finnair refused to book us on competitor. And said they could get us to Bergen the next day, while our ship was long gone. Told Finnair to give us airport hotel (good one) at the airport, and vouchers for dinner and breakfast. While waiting for dinner, we called Hurtigruten and told them what happened. They said they would take care of it. About 1AM they called us to say they booked us on SAS to Copenhagen, connecting to Allesund( the ship’s first stop). When we got on the first SAS flight, they gave us a bottle of champagne to make us smile. That night, on the ship, I filed an EU261. We received a deposit in our bank for full compensation( flight cancellation and E260 for two of us. AND WE RECEIVED IT BEFORE OUR CRUISE WAS EVEN OVER.
So, we never take off shoes. At MLA and HEL we don’t have to open up our bags to show bag with bottles, computers or any electronics. And shortly, we won’t have to put liquids in bags.
I say all this not to torment you, but to suggest that even in America progress can happen.
p.s. Have never stood in any line to enter a lounge in Malta, Frankfurt, Helsinki, Vienna, Rome, Paris, Copenhagen, Tallinn, or other cities in Europe, or in Singapore, Papeete. Osaka or Tokyo. And if that doesn’t destroy your cherished beliefs, I have come across no one stuffing their bags full of lounge food.
Europe is far from perfect but does care about its citizens and residents.
Looked like a neat experience! Nice that the menu had pictures of the food options.
The logo reminds me of a pizzeria tablecloth (not a criticism).
@AlanZ — You’ve given a good overview of Gary’s recent posts/topics! Oh yes, have not lost hope, personally, but definitely need to be patient here and ‘fight the good fight.’ We, in the USA, do tend to favor our corporations, allowing excessive greed and malfeasance to go unanswered for what seems like forever… until we don’t. Hopefully a backlash will come soon enough. And that we can fix, properly fund, and prevent the harms of today.
As to Finnair, had a similar experience; maintenance issue; odd 2-days late re-routing, would’ve missed safari. Had to rebook, last-minute with a competitor. Airline denied any reimbursements, claimed ‘EU261 didn’t apply,’ partial refund only, etc. Cost us several thousand extra dollars. Travel insurance denied claims because delay wasn’t over ’72 hours’ or more than ‘50% of the Trip’ (read that fine print, I guess). So, yeah, not even travel insurance is a panacea. We’re often ‘on our own’ when things don’t go well. Should be better than that.