Lufthansa Express (1995)

Las compañías no son muy originales a la hora de crear nuevas filiales: normalmente, añaden a su propio nombre Express, Regional o, ya en el colmo de la originalidad, Connect. Las que verdaderamente tiran la casa por la ventana usan nombres como Cityline, Citylink o Cityhopper para sus operadores regionales ...

Ya veis que lo de añadir Express a una filial de bajo coste (de operación) no es nuevo en absoluto: en los 90, ante la creciente competencia en el mercado doméstico alemán, con la entrada de compañías como ✈German Wings  otras, Lufthansa sacó este producto diferenciado, que volaba en el mercado interno. Tenía algunas novedades importantes para la época como las máquinas de auto check-in y  un servicio simplificado que estaba, de todas formas, bastante alejado de lo que hoy entendemos por una LCC.

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Generally speaking, airlines don't think much about the name when creating a new subsidiary: Express or Regional are frequently used after the mainline name as taglines, and the most original ones use Connect. Truly adventorous airlines use Cityline, Citylik or Cityhopper for their regional carriers.

As you can see, Iberia Express was certainly not the first airline created by a legacy carrier to keep operation costs down. Worried by increased concurrency in the German domestic market, when airlines such as ✈German Wings and others were starting to take a portion of the German carrier market share. Lufthansa launched its Express branch in the mid 90's. It had some interesting perks at the time, such as self check-in kiosks, and it also offered a simplified onboard product, but was nevertheless nothing really like the LCC airlines as we know them today.