Court Line Aviation was one of the first UK airlines to seize the opportunities offered by a burgeoning appetite for foreign holidays in the early 1970s. The airline helped pioneer the concept of ‘cheap and cheerful’ package holidays to various Mediterranean hotspots alongside its in-house holiday company.
The airline also established a whole new way of holidaymaking for the British public. However, a period of rapid growth followed by a harsh economic downtown sealed the fate of this rather unique and flamboyant carrier.
The start of operations
Court Line Aviation was the airline offshoot of the Court Line Group, whose primary interests were shipping and a travel company named Clarksons Holidays. The airline was initially called Argus Air Transport, formed in 1957 and based at Luton Airport in Bedfordshire, England (now renamed London Luton Airport). In 1960, it became Autair, and later became Autair International Airways in 1963.
Autair operated several scheduled and charter passenger flights and freight-only operations using various aircraft during the 1960s, including Douglas DC-3s and Vickers Vikings. Both types became increasingly used for inclusive tour (IT) operations as the demand for package holidays increased in the late 1960s.
One of the early customers for Autair’s services was Clarksons Holidays (formed in 1964). Their relationship started with the holiday company chartering Autair’s Vikings to take holidaymakers from various UK airports to Rotterdam to visit the Dutch bulb fields for day trips. Later, Airspeed Ambassadors and Handley Page Heralds would also be used on these charters.
In time, and with demand soaring for its holidays, Clarksons Holidays soon became Autair’s single most important customer. With the relationship between the two companies becoming ever closer, the directors of Court Line Group decided to bring the entire inclusive tour offering in-house to provide synergies to the Group’s holiday operations. In April 1965, Court Line Group purchased the entire share capital of Autair for £215,000 (US$260,000 at today’s prices).
With new owners and capital injection, Autair embarked on a period of sustained growth. The airline purchased several brand new BAC One-Eleven series 400 twinjets direct from British Aerospace, the manufacturer, taking it into the jet age for the first time.
As the UK-originating package holiday industry continues to grow, Autair consolidated its operations. It withdrew from all its scheduled routes in the summer of 1969. With it, all of its remaining turboprop aircraft were withdrawn, leaving a dedicated fleet of One-Elevens for inclusive tour flights on behalf of Clarksons Holidays.
While the scheduled services accounted for just 12% of the airline’s annual turnover, this equated to a loss of £150,000 (US$ 180,000) annually on the company’s bottom line.
Alongside this announcement came an order for seven further BAC One-Eleven aircraft. However, this new batch would be the larger 500 series version, offering greater capacity, extended range, and better economics over its smaller sisterships already in service.
Court Line Aviation is born
With the arrival of the larger One-Eleven 500s, the airline took the opportunity to re-brand itself and introduce a fresh new look and feel to its operation. A new strategy was also introduced, which would see the airline focus entirely on the package holiday business, by this time growing rapidly and offering opportunities for the early pioneer airlines willing to embrace the challenge.
The new corporate identity incorporated a new, all-over single-color livery design, not dissimilar to that adopted by Braniff in the United States, which I reported on earlier this year. To bring the airliner’s image with the ‘feel good factor’ of going on holiday, each One-Eleven aircraft was allocated one of several distinctive, eye-catching pastel color combinations –
- Yellow, gold, and orange
- Pink, rose, and magenta
- Violet, mauve, and purple
- Light green, mid-green, forest green
These color schemes were named the Halcyon Skies color schemes, and the aircraft were similarly named. The cabin crew wore newly-introduced uniforms designed by famed British fashion designer Mary Quant. A new corporate image combined with the onboard experience made passengers feel that the flight to their holiday was the first part of their holiday.
Although with rapidly increasing demand came increased competition, particularly in Court Line’s backyard from the lies of Britannia Airways and Monarch Airlines, the carrier held its own as Clarksons Holidays became the undisputed cut-price leader in the Inclusive Tour market.
In 1973, Clarksons took 1.1 million people on holiday, most of which flew on Court Line Aviation’s aircraft. Indeed, this number represented over 70% of the carrier’s charter capacity for that year.
Court Line Aviation and Clarksons Holidays were also industry pioneers of the ‘time charter‘ concept, whereby the airline entered into a long-term relationship with the tour operator. Time charter arrangements were modeled on similar long-term agreements between ship owners and charterers, which had been the bread and butter business for the Court Line Group for many years.
Time charters resulted in greater economic security for the charter airline industry and enabled it to acquire new aircraft on more favorable terms.
The introduction of seat-back catering
As another mark of its pioneering spirit, Court Line Aviation invented and introduced the concept of seat-back catering. The concept consisted of pre-packed meals or snacks being loaded into a small, two-shelf compartment in the seat back in front of every passenger.
The meal or snack for the outbound journey could be found in the top compartment, with the one for the return trip in the lower section. The latter contained a pellet of dry ice placed under the plastic food container, thus preventing the food from spoiling. The concept eliminated handling trays while airborne for the airline’s flight attendants and reduced their workload.
To prevent outbound passengers from consuming meals intended for return passengers, locks needed to be installed on the lower compartment that could only be opened by cabin staff during the aircraft’s turnaround at the destination airport.
The introduction of this new concept permitted a reduction in the required galleys in aircraft cabins, thus allowing for a further three seats on the airline’s One-Elevens. By introducing this concept and the subsequent increase in aircraft seat densities, the drop in individual seat rates allowed tour operators to offer cheaper holidays and thus maintain their market share in a price-sensitive and highly competitive environment.
The cost advantage offered to Court Line by adopting the seat-back catering concept eventually forced every other major UK charter airline to adopt similar seat-back catering arrangements on most short and medium-haul inclusive tour flights during the 1970s.
Welcoming the widebodies
With burgeoning demand for its services, Court Line Aviation soon needed something bigger than its One-Elevens to offer its customers. Hence, in 1972, the airline leased a Lockheed L1011 Tristar (registered N305EA) from Eastern Airlines in the United States on a trial basis.
Impressing customers and the airline’s executives alike, two brand new Tristars were ordered from Lockheed for the following year’s peak season.
In 1973, Court Line Aviation took delivery of its new pair of Tristars, thus becoming the first European operator of the new three-engined passenger widebody. The aircraft (registered G-BAAA named ‘Halcyon Days‘ and G-BAAB named ‘Halcyon Breeze‘) were acquired on 15-year leases from Airlease International, a consortium of eleven British banks and financial institutions.
The two new plans were uniquely customized to Court Line specifications with double-width doors to speed up passenger evacuation and featuring integral passenger stairs and baggage conveyors to facilitate operations at the smaller airports around the Mediterranean served by the airline.
However, introducing these brand-new widebodies was a big gamble for a small airline operating in a seasonal market with tight margins. The upscaling to the Tristars was a significant jump upwards for the airline, as the new jets seating 476 passengers had four times the One-Eleven’s passenger capacity of 119.
However, Clarksons was convinced that the inclusive tour market would continue to grow and that the additional capacity could be filled with ease.
Falling on hard times
Despite the airline carrying a considerable amount of passengers annually, as early as 1971, Clarksons was losing money. By 1972, Clarkson’s losses had grown to £4.8 million (US$5.8 million).
During the 1973/74 winter season, the Clarksons Holidays’ financial position worsened. At the time, the UK was in the grip of a deep economic recession, which coincided with the global oil crisis of 1973 also having a significant impact on aviation fuel prices.
Consequently, following a period of exponential growth, 1974 became the worst year yet for the UK package tour industry. The mandated adoption of a three-day working week led to an immediate reduction in package holiday bookings by 30%.
Clarksons, Court Line’s primary customer and in-house tour operator since April 1973, was facing mounting financial pressure. An ill-conceived takeover of close rival Horizon Holidays did little to aid the situation faced by Court Line Aviation and Clarksons.
Clarksons’ financial position further deteriorated following desperate attempts to fill the group’s planes and hotel rooms to keep cash flowing so it might stay afloat. Clarksons continued selling holiday packages well below cost.
Bankruptcy and closing the business
On August 15th, 1974, the entire Court Line Group ran out of money. The Group went bankrupt, canceled all outstanding holidays, and immediately grounded all flights. The following day, with little prospect of resurrecting the companies involved, the Court Line Group’s UK-based subsidiaries went into voluntary liquidation, including both Court Line Aviation and Clarksons Holidays.
At the time of its bankruptcy and grounding, the Court Line Aviation fleet comprised the two TriStars and nine One-Eleven 500s. The airline’s 1,150 staff lost their jobs, and as many as 49,000 holidaymakers were stranded overseas with no means to return home to the UK. The airline was in debt to the tune of at least £7 million (US$8.4 million).
According to some reports from the time, Court Line Aviation was itself a viable business. However, a proposed last-minute management buyout was rejected as the airline’s liquidation value (how much would have been raised by selling all the carrier’s assets) was less than what was required to pay off the parent company’s debts.
To enable stranded holidaymakers to return to the UK at no additional cost, the collapsed group’s rivals organized an airlift through the Tour Operators’ Study Group (TOSG). This operation was paid for using the £3.5million (US$4.2 million) bond the failed group had deposited with TOSG.
As a result of the failure of Clarksons and Court Line Aviation, The Association of Britsh Travel Agents (ABTA) set up a fund to provide insurance against such an event in the future. This was a compulsory bonding for travel companies that transported their customers by air.
This same scheme was used to repatriate customers stranded abroad when both Monarch Airlines and Thomas Cook ceased trading in 2017 and 2019, respectively.
What happened to the aircraft?
Following the spectacular crash of Court Line Aviation and Clarksons at the height of the 1974 holiday season, the failed carrier’s relatively new aircraft were quickly acquired by other airlines.
The new Tristars swiftly found a new home in Hong Kong with Cathay Pacific Airways, with whom they flew until 1995 (G-BAAB) and 1996 (G-BAAA) and respectively.
Meanwhile, two other UK charter airlines, Dan-Air London and Monarch Airlines purchased four and two of the One-Eleven 500 fleet, respectively. These aircraft were subsequently re-registered to avoid having them impounded by overseas airport authorities in lieu of the airport user charges incurred by Court Line Aviation.
Although a very successful early pioneer in the inclusive tour package holiday market, Court Line Aviation was unlucky. The airline grew quickly and invested in new aircraft just months before the UK economy took a nose dive and the single market it existed to serve collapsed.
However, the pioneering spirit at Court Line Aviation and the boldness of its operations make it a valuable and interesting subject for anyone interested in the history of leisure air travel.
Indeed, without Court Line Aviation laying the groundwork, arguably, many of the leisure and low-cost airlines that we know today, both in the UK and worldwide, may not exist in the form they do.
Source: simpleflying.com