Memoirs from the Orange Army

The Orange Beginning

easyJet. In the beginning, was like a lonely child in the playground. They had fun poked at them regarding their pioneering view of how an airline should be. They were ridiculed over their choice of uniforms and were told they wouldn't last a year. When they made their inaugural flight that cold and dark morning from London's Luton Airport to Glasgow on 10th November 1995, many of the seventy staff employed by the airline at the time stood with their fingers crossed that they would still be in their jobs a year later.

All of the big established airlines such as British Airways, United Airlines and Virgin Atlantic stood their ground and ridiculed this sudden burst of orange. They're all professional, polished and glamorous airlines. easyJet became the centre of ridicule with its revolutionary ways; it was a ticketless airline, free seating onboard the aircraft and you could pick and choose which food you actually wanted to buy rather than being served the generalised menu so many polished airlines provide.

As you might remember, when it came to the uniform, the company certainly looked low cost. A pair of black jeans (which were much like the ones they waved at the camera when they first began to advertise) and an orange polo neck shirt with the 'I'm an easyCrew member' slapped across the back. Add a flamboyant airline manager into the mix to parade them around the airline and it, quite frankly, certainly screamed low cost to the world. Sir Stelios Haji-Loannou was just like that embarrassing parent who will kiss you in front of your new friends at the school gate after your first day.

The ideology of easyJet starting out as a serious airline was certainly never going to be expected to last and many people were finding it difficult to adjust to these new ideas that came with this fresh coat of orange paint. It was five days after their inaugural flight to Glasgow that easyJet launched their second from Luton to Edinburgh. The public began to vote with their feet and chose to fly orange. There was a real buzz of excitement not just for the airline and its staff but also for its first passengers as they knew they were becoming a part of something new in an age where new airlines would come and go on a daily basis.

What EasyJet needed was a chance. They needed to find a way to prove how good they were. Little did they realise that not only would that chance come along sooner than they thought but also it would open a whole new set of doors for them. They were going to expand and multiply with a careful strategy of painting the UK and Europe with the orange spirit that would soon inspire the world to fly and become a part of Generation easyJet.