What’s Really Wow About Iceland’s WOW Air: Gay-Rights!

You know Iceland for its magnificent natural beauty. You admire its serene icy-cool climate, you love to snuggle up some brandy whilst you are there. You can hum, almost endlessly, the many soulful melodies crooned by Bjork: undoubtedly, a national treasure in Iceland.

But hey, wait. That’s not all there is about Iceland. One wonders why the enchanting Nordic Island nation doesn’t get featured all that much in the global media when apart from travel, food and culture, there’s another interesting element to Iceland?

Chances are, few of you have heard of a very special Icelandic delight- WOW Air. Have you?

Now, one might ask what is so special about WOW Air. Even though this might sound interesting albeit in lighter vein, a few years back arguably Iceland’s most frequently used airline came out with a special thematic airplane.

It was last year in February 2016 when one of Iceland’s major carrier came out with a TF Airbus A330. It was simply named “TF-Gay”. Surprised? One might be. But in a brilliant masterstroke of pushing for more cultural inclusion, the pink-coloured air carrier, still in operation batted mightily well to strengthen the support toward the gay movement.

Iceland, of course, being one of the countries that has inflicted no regulations or restrictions upon gay relations, thus far. In fact, the all pink airplane continues to fly regularly to San Francisco, in the United States.

In recent times, strong economic success and great business acumen has resulted in making WOW Air Iceland’s airway of choice, with more travellers/ commuters flying with the airline than Icelandair, which is Iceland’s oldest airline. Speaking of burgeoning travel figures pertaining to the third quarter of 2017, WOW Air’s Managing Director Skuli Mogensen pointed to 38% of travel share of WOW Air, when compared to 28& of other airlines and 34% for Icelandair.

One of the factors, of course, that has contributed to WOW Air’s whirlwind success is it being a low-cost airline. But in fact, its emphatic themes such as going all ‘pink’ in support and solidarity to a community often marginalised that adds the additional pull or gravitas to the airline; something one doesn’t get to experience all too often.