easyJet has been active in Amsterdam since 1996, although it only opened a main office in the Dutch capital about a year ago, and has been operating flights from there to more than 20 destinations across Europe. It was only a matter of time before the company would seek to operate flights from the city to Israel as well, as Amsterdam is considered a popular destination among Israeli passengers and European tourists.
Another reason appears to be the company's desire to compete against Transavia, the low-cost airline owned by Air France-KLM, which operates cheap flights from Amsterdam to Tel Aviv and from Paris to Tel Aviv. Transavia was the reason for the delay in the operation of easyJet flights between France and Israel.
'We'll increase the number of routes to Israel'
easyJet Network Development Manager Neil Slaven, who is in charge of the routes to Israel, visited the country several months ago and indicated that the company had conducted research which pointed to the profitability of an Amsterdam-Tel Aviv route.
easyJet is currently the second most active foreign airline in Israel after Turkish Airlines. Since the beginning of the year, the company has carried some 194,000 passengers from Israel to different destinations in Europe, a 24% growth from the first four months of 2014. In the past year, the company carried some 382,000 passengers between Israel and Europe.
EasyJet CEO Carolyn McCall said in a recent conversation with Israeli reporters that the company planned to add routes and frequencies to Israel by demand. She added that the company's flights to Israel positioned it as one of the airlines with the highest volume of activity in the country and that she planned to remain in that position.
"We will increase the number of routes to Israel and constantly look into new destinations," she said, adding that when the company first begun its activity in Israel most of its passengers were tourists arriving in Israel. Within a short period of time, the number of Israelis using the company's services jumped to 40%.