Good morning from Calgary International Airport!
My name is Alex, and welcome to this trip report.
Today, I’m flying to Vancouver, British Columbia, with Flair Airlines, on board their
“new” Boeing 737-800.
Flair Airlines is a Canadian low-cost carrier that started up in 2005 as a charter airline.
They began scheduled flights as “Canada’s Low Fare Airline” in 2017, with a fleet
of 7 Boeing 737-400s.
Long story short, they rebranded again in February, opting for a more minimalistic look
across the board, as well as this... neon green new livery for their new 737-800s.
I flew with them on their 737-400 last year before they rebranded, and it was pretty much
a bare bones experience as you would expect, so I don’t think today’s flight will be
much different.
We’ll be departing from gate 32 today, and here’s our inbound aircraft, arriving from Toronto!
C-FFLJ is Flair’s third Boeing 737-800, and was delivered to them in August.
Now, I do realize I titled this video, “Canada’s most questionable livery”, but I actually
think this new paint job of Flair’s might be a stroke of genius.
Say what you will, but it’s got a lot of people talking about it, and that kind of
publicity and recognition is something that Flair really needs in the Canadian market.
That said, it’s pretty cold in Calgary today,
so thankfully, our aircraft’s been de-iced ahead of time!
Alright, assuming you didn’t click off the video just now, let’s go see what Flair’s
737-800 is like.
My seat for today’s flight is an exit row seat, 15F.
Flair’s 737s are in an all-economy configuration, so for the sake of my 6’8” self,
I paid extra for the exit row right off the bat.
As with most 737 exit rows, the legroom here is excellent.
What’s really surprising though is, this aircraft has the new Boeing Sky Interior!
I think FLJ is the only one of Flair’s three 737-800s with it, and it makes a huge difference!
The seats are fairly standard, no adjustable headrests, but the funny thing is, there are
actually two tray tables you can use, one in the armrest and one on the seat back as
you’d normally have.
And, if you really want, you can use both at the same time.
While we’re still on the ground, I may as well take a look at the seatback pocket.
On this 737-800, Flair has a standard safety card,
… an air sickness bag,
… and a buy-on-board menu.
As a low cost carrier, Flair doesn’t have any complimentary food or drink, so you essentially
pay for most of the extras.
The selection is pretty decent, and the prices are what you’d expect.
As we push back for de-icing, you can tell that Flair can’t wait to get rid of those
old 737-400s.
We ended up boarding the aircraft about 30 minutes late, and then were told we had to
wait even longer at the gate due to traffic on the deice pad.
Unfortunately, we only received a spray of type 1 deice fluid today, which doesn’t
match the livery as well as type four fluid would’ve!
Finally, we left Calgary’s west de-ice pad, now about 90 minutes behind schedule, and
taxied for departure off of runway 35L.
I’ve called this aircraft one of Flair’s “new” 737-800s, but it’s actually about
8 years old, and flew with a few different airlines before Flair.
One such airline was Air Berlin, and if you look closely you can still see their logo
on the front and back walls of the cabin!
The lavatory in the back of the aircraft is fairly average, a bit small, but it’s what
you’d expect on an all-economy 737 like this.
On this particular aircraft, Flair has 186 seats, with 31 rows total.
It’s worth noting that Flair doesn’t immediately tell you on their website
which 737 variant you’re flying on.
There is a way to tell though- when you select your seats, if the seat map goes up to row
27, it’ll be a 737-400, and if it goes up to row 32, it’ll be the newer 737-800.
On today’s flight, I opted for a can of Pringles and some Pepsi, which set me back
about 7 dollars total.
I actually don’t mind this concept, you get what you pay for, and considering the
base fare for this flight was something like 60 dollars, I’m pretty happy with this.
Sadly, no spectacular views of the Rockies today, but after about an hour in the air,
we started our descent into Vancouver, landing on runway 08L.
So despite the 90 minute delay, the majority of which wasn’t actually Flair’s fault,
I really enjoyed this flight.
The cabin crew were all quite friendly and apologetic for the delay, and the cabin itself
looked fantastic.
Sky Interior is definitely a huge bonus, and I think Flair scored big time with this specific plane.
especially with the used aircraft market the way it is right now.
Honestly though, this flight was leaps and bounds ahead of my previous ones on their 737-400.
Canada’s aviation industry is in dire need of competition these days, and I do think
Flair can bring that to the table.
I wish them the best, and will happily fly with them again in the future.
That concludes my experience on Flair Airlines’ Boeing 737-800, wearing Canada’s most questionable livery.
Thank you very much for watching this trip report.
Please, leave a like if you enjoyed the video, subscribe if you’re new to the channel,
and I’ll see you in the next one.