ITA Airways, Volare has one million subscribers. Now, however, it needs the award chart and everything else

Last night, Emiliana Limosani, CEO of Volare and CCO of ITA Airways, announced the historic milestone of one million members in the loyalty program of the new Italian flag carrier.

"The achievement confirms how ITA Airways is continuing to work toward its primary goal of putting the customer at the center of the business, with a program that revolves around their needs," said Emiliana Limosani, Chief Commercial Officer of ITA Airways and CEO Volare - and this milestone is a confirmation of that. We are happy that our customers choose us on a daily basis for leisure and business travel, as well as rely on the services and products of the partners who have joined the program in recent months."

1 million subscribers to Volare

When the October 15, 2021 ITA took off for the first time did so with the launch of the new frequent flyer program called Volare. Obligatory choice, since in the constraints imposed by Brussels, for the birth from the ashes of Alitalia of ITA, there was The inability of the newco to acquire the Millemiglia program., what has always been the most popular loyalty used by Italian frequent travelers.

Today, some 17 months later, Volare has surpassed 1 million subscribers. Millemiglia users were more than 5 million but active users were just over 1 in 5, so you could say mission accomplished.

This result was achieved by the Italian flag carrier thanks to 3 status match campaigns, which made it possible to largely recover Millemiglia users in full compliance with the rules imposed by the European Commission, and a fair number of international users enticed by the possibility of effortlessly obtaining an Elite card in a Skyteam company.

Flying celebrates first birthday: there's a gift, but it's not the one hoped for

More recently, there have also been a couple of campaigns using the "introduce a friend" model, that allowed them to make the final push toward today's finish line. The goal of half a million had been reached in July 2022: it took an additional 8 months to get another 500k members.

Clothes do not make the man

One million members may seem like a lot, but many users simply joined the status match and others took the card in advance without even flying. To have a term of comparison Flying Blue, the Air France and KLM frequent flyer, has more than half a million Italian users.

Having such a rich database is an important assett, but it is evident that users have accumulated on VOLARE only ITA flights, because impossible to believe on other loyalty programs, and foreign members have not done any activity, as the Volare card has no value in Skyteam.

Translated in a nutshell, Flying is still not the source of income that brings fresh money into ITA's coffers and lots of it as is the case with all loyalty programs of all global companies.

What's still missing from Volare

Those who read TFC often will have noticed that we are very sensitive to everything about Flying. And it could not be otherwise since it is the loyalty program of the Italian flag carrier. As of today, however, the program is stumped or, As we like to call him, he is a lame duck (and wingless).

1. The award chart is missing. All loyalty programs in the world allow you to use points to redeem your reward. All but Flying. Impossible in fact to use points to book an award ticket. Points can only be used in cash and miles mode, that is, where points have a fixed value that can be translated into euros. If, for example, I could previously detach a round-trip ticket to fly in business from Genoa to New York in Magnifica class using only 80 thousand Millemiglia points, today the same 80k fly points are worth only 400€, a figure that obviously does not even cover an economy ticket.
2. A true alliance is lacking. From the first day ITA Airways has joined Skyteam, but it was a faux membership lacking the real benefits that are at the heart of aviation alliances. Volare status is not recognized by other carriers. Except in very rare cases, passengers with Elite+ status in the Italian FF are bounced at lounge doors around the world, not getting priority boarding and all the other benefits provided. However, the same thing happens to Skyteam Elite+ passengers in Italy: suffice it to say. at Milan Linate, passengers flying aboard Air France and KLM are turned away at the entrance to ITA's lounge and invited to visit the Leonardo Hall.
3. No accumulation of points with partners. As we have also seen with the recent entry of Virgin Atlantic in Skyteam, those who travel with alliance partners do not accumulate points on the Volare card. Not only do you not accumulate them when you fly, for example Air France or Delta, but nothing accumulates even when the ticket is sold by ITA and there are code-share flights with other companies other than the tricolor company. And to date the only other partnership was signed with Korean, not exactly the most popular carrier used by Italians.
4. No prize tickets with partners. Just as there is no possibility of booking an award ticket on board ITA, there is, of course, no possibility of booking an award ticket on board any of the other Skyteam carriers. And what makes one wonder is that Millemiglia, while orphaned by an airline, Allows members to book award tickets with Air France and KLM.
   
5. Lack of a financial partner. We saw during the week the first agreement with American Express and it is therefore likely that sooner or later the Amex ITA Airways co-branded credit cards, as was the case with the very popular Alitalia credit cards. The importance of these cards is that they allow users to earn Volare points with each expense made with the card, points that Amex buys from Volare and thus produces cash for the airline.

Sale ITA, what future for Volare

ITA Airways sale, goodbye frequent flyer Volare: new Miles&More cards by year's end

Sooner or later it will take the official start the Lufthansa stage. We will have to wait for the final green light from the EU to the divestment of the company, and if all goes smoothly it will come in late summer, if not fall.

What is certain, however, is that Volare cannot remain in this middle ground very long. Surely the move to the Star Alliance will be immediate, more difficult that the move to Miles&More will also be immediate.

Going into the new alliance, all agreements will have to be rewritten, and in this, we hope that LH will put adequate support on the table for the transition to allow not only smooth progress in alliances and code-share agreements, but also and especially in the key of points accumulation and reward ticket redemption.

In conclusion

We could say. Flying gave himself a birthday present, but now the time has come for maturity. In ITA they have one chance not to permanently lose the little remaining trust of Italian FFs, who might, for example, decide to credit future flights aboard AZ on the cards of other Star Alliance loyalty programs resulting in lost revenue and, indeed, increased expenses for the Italian flag carrier.

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