In 2021, Iberia focused on emerging from the Covid crisis by restoring routes and services and stimulating demand.
Recovery of Routes and Services
Throughout the year Iberia acted boldly in all its markets to restore the routes and services interrupted by the pandemic, and ended the year close to pre-pandemic global coverage.
In a year marking the 75th anniversary of its first regular services to Latin America, Iberia upped flight frequencies to Mexico, the Dominican Republic, and Colombia, with increases planned to Argentina in the early months of 2022.
The reopening by the United States to European tourism was a major boost to Iberia, which now operates 70 flights per week between Madrid and New York, Miami, Chicago, Los Angeles, and Boston.
Given the success of Iberia’s new route to the Maldives, launched last summer, Iberia decided to keep it going through the winter, doing the same with its new route to Cali in Colombia.
On the Spanish mainland, the airline increased its Madrid-Barcelona walk-on shuttle service by 50%, while adding flights to Corunna, Asturias, Bilbao, Santander, and San Sebastian.
Innovation to Ensure a Smoother and Safer Travel Experience
In 2021 and looking to the years ahead the airline chose to focus on innovation and sustainability, in order to provide customers with a smoother, safer, and more comfortable travel experience, making its Madrid hub a model of efficiency and a leader in sustainable practices.
Communication with customers has become omni-channel, eliminating duplications, merging all service information flows and making them available 24/7 through the iberia.com website and the smartphone app. These include an interactive map showing the health restrictions of each country, a list of Covid testing sites, and the possibility of purchasing or changing tickets, checking in for flights, tracking flight status, or finding the right boarding gates or luggage delivery carousels.
Iberia has developed several apps for digitising and verifying all Covid-related documentation.
At the airport, Iberia has streamlined most procedures and made them “contactless”, from on-line check-in to checking luggage at home, and from digitising health documents to biometric passenger identification at security control and boarding gates.
Iberia’s Two Additional Business Units
Iberia Maintenance has redoubled its customer care efforts, returning aircraft with the greatest flexibility, while positioning itself as a leading facility both for IAG Group and third-party airlines in southern Europe. Meanwhile, it prepared itself to inspect and overhaul the latest generation of LEAP and GTF aircraft engines.
Iberia Airport Services prepared for the next round of bidding for airport handling contracts, optimising procedures and using real-time monitoring tools such as Kepler and IRIS. Pioneering its “green handling” policy are new, remote-controlled electric runway tractors, as electric power progressively replaces internal combustion on most ground equipment.
Sustainability Strategy
Looking to the future, Iberia’s sustainability strategy is focused on 1) optimising operational efficiency, 2) a more sustainable customer experience, and 3) commitment to R&D to develop sustainable aviation fuel, along with other technologies.
In collaboration with the Spanish oil company Repsol, in November Iberia made its first flight using sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) from Madrid to Bilbao, in an Airbus A320neo, avoiding the emission og 1.4 million tonnes of CO2. The airline has pledged to use SAF in 10% of its flights by 2030.
Meanwhile, Iberia has launched its CO2 calculator app, enabling customers to view their CO2 footprint on each flight.
At the same time, Iberia completed the installation of Spain’s largest self-supply solar power self-supply installation, with solar panels now covering the roof of its large maintenance hangar at Madrid airport. The 10,000 sq.m surface is rated at 2MW and generates 80 million kWh.
A Year of Solidarity
The pandemic provided many opportunities to show the vital role played by aviation to serve civil society.
During the year Iberia made new repatriation flights to Nepal, Morocco, and Venezuela, for a total of 70 flights to 201 countries since the pandemic outbreak.
Iberia, in conjunction with IAG Cargo, carried some six million doses of Covid vaccine to Spain’s Canary and Balearic Islands, its North African city Melilla, and also to El Salvador, Mexico, Chile, the Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Uruguay, and Peru.
