WestJet

Founding and early operations

WestJet was founded on June 27, 1994, by a group of entrepreneurs including Clive Beddoe, David Neeleman, Mark Hill, Tim Morgan, and Donald Bell. The airline's business model was directly inspired by the successful low-cost carrier operations of Southwest Airlines and Morris Air in the United States. Its initial focus was exclusively on Western Canada, a regional emphasis that provided the inspiration for the company's name. The airline commenced operations on February 29, 1996, with a modest fleet of three used Boeing 737-200 aircraft and 220 employees serving five destinations: Calgary, Edmonton, Kelowna, Vancouver, and Winnipeg.

Growth was rapid in the first few years, with the network expanding to include Regina, Saskatoon, and Victoria by the end of 1996. The airline faced an early operational challenge in September 1996 when its entire fleet was grounded for two weeks due to a disagreement with Transport Canada over maintenance schedules. By 1999, WestJet had added cities like Thunder Bay, Grande Prairie, and Prince George to its route map. That same year, Clive Beddoe stepped down as chief executive officer, handing the role to former Air Ontario executive Steve Smith. The company also made its initial public offering in July 1999, selling 2.5 million shares at ten dollars each.

Steve Smith's tenure as CEO lasted only 18 months, ending in 2000 due to differences in management style. Following his departure, Smith went on to lead Zip, Air Canada's low-cost subsidiary. Founder Clive Beddoe returned to the chief executive role, which he held until July 2007. During this period, WestJet solidified its position as the third largest airline in Canada, behind Canadian Airlines International and Air Canada. The airline's early culture was built on a cost-conscious model and an employee-ownership philosophy, encapsulated in its original slogan, "Owners Care".

Expansion across Canada and first international routes

The consolidation of the Canadian airline industry in 2000, when Air Canada acquired its main rival, Canadian Airlines International, created an opportunity for WestJet to expand eastward. The airline began service to Hamilton and Ottawa in Ontario and Moncton, New Brunswick, selecting Hamilton's airport as its initial eastern Canadian connection point. This move marked the beginning of WestJet's transformation from a regional western carrier into a truly national airline. Throughout the early 2000s, the airline steadily added more eastern points, including Toronto, Montreal, Halifax, and St. John's. The airline also briefly served smaller communities like Comox, Sault Ste. Marie, and Thompson during this period, though these routes were later withdrawn and some were eventually resumed by the WestJet Encore subsidiary.

WestJet's first foray beyond North America came in 2006 with scheduled service to Nassau, The Bahamas. This was a strategic milestone that signaled the company's ambitions for broader international market presence. Prior to this, the airline had begun serving United States destinations like San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Florida starting in 2004. A significant operational expansion occurred in 2005 when WestJet inaugurated service to Hawaii from Vancouver, which required the implementation of extended-range twin-engine operations (ETOPS) certification. The airline also engaged in charter agreements, such as a two-year pact with Air Transat beginning in 2003, to fly vacationers to sun destinations like Mexico and the Caribbean, an agreement that ended amicably in February 2009.

In 2004, WestJet became embroiled in a major legal dispute with Air Canada, which accused the smaller carrier of industrial espionage. Air Canada filed a civil suit alleging WestJet accessed confidential information from a private website. WestJet admitted to the charges in May 2006 and agreed to pay Air Canada 5.5 million dollars for legal fees and donate 10 million dollars to children's charities. This settlement allowed the company to move forward with its growth plans. During this period, WestJet also shifted the focus of its eastern operations from Hamilton to Toronto Pearson International Airport in April 2004, fully entering the competitive Toronto-Ottawa-Montreal triangle and tripling its flights out of Toronto.

Fleet modernization and transatlantic service

As WestJet's network grew, so did its need for larger and more capable aircraft. In 2015, the airline took a major step by introducing its first wide-body jets, acquiring four Boeing 767-300ER aircraft. These planes were initially deployed on high-demand seasonal routes from Alberta to Hawaii, replacing a wet-lease agreement with Thomas Cook Airlines. The addition of wide-body aircraft directly enabled the launch of transatlantic services. WestJet's first European destination was Dublin, Ireland, with seasonal flights from St. John's beginning in 2014. This was followed by service to Glasgow and, in 2016, a major expansion to London's Gatwick Airport from multiple Canadian cities including Calgary, Toronto, and Vancouver.

The airline continued to modernize its fleet with the order of next-generation Boeing 787-9 Dreamliners, with the first aircraft delivered in January 2019. These fuel-efficient jets were introduced on key long-haul routes from Calgary to London, Paris, and Dublin starting in April 2019. Alongside its mainline growth, WestJet also developed a regional subsidiary. WestJet Encore was launched to operate De Havilland Dash 8 Q400 aircraft on shorter routes, often serving smaller communities in Western Canada and elsewhere. This subsidiary helped feed traffic into the mainline network and expanded the group's overall reach, resuming service to cities like Brandon, Manitoba and Sudbury, Ontario that had been previously dropped by the mainline carrier.

The company also invested in its corporate infrastructure during this period. In 2007, WestJet commissioned the construction of a new six-story head office building next to its hangar at Calgary International Airport. The building was designed to meet LEED Gold environmental standards, featuring a rainwater retention system and geothermal heating. Employees began moving into the new WestJet Campus in early 2009, and the building officially opened in May of that year, receiving its LEED Gold certification in October 2011. This headquarters consolidation supported the growing workforce as the airline expanded its domestic market share from just 7 percent in 2000 to 38 percent by the end of 2009, while Air Canada's share fell from 77 percent to 55 percent over the same decade.

Strategic shifts and the Onex acquisition

The late 2010s were a period of significant strategic evolution for WestJet. Under CEO Gregg Saretsky, the airline publicly stated its goal to transition from a low-cost carrier to a global, full-service airline. This shift was reflected in new service offerings like a redesigned premium economy cabin on its Boeing 737 fleet, which began on the 737 MAX 8 aircraft in winter 2018 and featured a wider 2-2 seating configuration. Concurrently, to compete with new ultra-low-cost entrants in the Canadian market like Flair Airlines, WestJet created a separate subsidiary named Swoop, which began operations in June 2018 after a delay from its originally planned late 2017 launch. Swoop operates a fleet of Boeing 737-800 aircraft with a bare-bones service model focused on the lowest possible fares.

In a landmark deal for the Canadian aviation industry, WestJet announced in May 2019 that it had agreed to be purchased by Toronto-based investment firm Onex Corporation for five billion Canadian dollars. The acquisition, which closed later that year, took the airline private. The purchase price was reportedly affected by the contemporaneous global grounding of the Boeing 737 MAX aircraft, of which WestJet had 13 in its fleet at the time with another 57 on order. This change in ownership marked a new chapter for the airline as it faced the severe challenges that would soon follow. The airline's leadership also changed during this period, with Ed Sims replacing Gregg Saretsky as CEO in March 2018 after Saretsky's retirement.

WestJet also pursued deeper alliances with other carriers during this time. In December 2017, WestJet and Delta Air Lines signed a preliminary memorandum of understanding to form a joint venture, which was finalized as a definitive ten-year agreement in July 2018. The proposed venture aimed to serve over 95 percent of Canada-U.S. travel demand and align frequent flier programs while co-locating at key hub airports. However, in November 2020, both airlines agreed to terminate the joint venture plans, stating that demands from the United States Department of Transportation were unreasonable and unacceptable. The airline also rebranded in October 2018, changing its slogan from "Owners Care" to "Love where you're going" and unveiling a new logo alongside details of the Boeing 787-9 arrival.

The COVID-19 pandemic and cargo venture

The COVID-19 pandemic in early 2020 caused an unprecedented collapse in global air travel demand, and WestJet was severely impacted. In March 2020, the airline suspended all international flights and was forced to make drastic workforce reductions. At the pandemic's peak, the company's employee count plummeted from a pre-pandemic level of over 14,000 to just 4,500 on the payroll, with thousands laid off or placed on temporary leave. The airline utilized federal wage subsidy programs to recall some staff temporarily, but further layoffs occurred through 2020 and into early 2021 as travel restrictions persisted, including an additional 250 staff laid off in February 2021.

In response to the crisis and a surge in demand for air freight, WestJet launched a dedicated cargo division. The airline converted former passenger Boeing 737-800 aircraft into freighters, known as 737-800BCFs, announcing the plan in June 2021 to benefit from heavy global cargo operations and disrupt the Canadian air cargo industry. The first freighter was delivered in April 2022, though certification from Transport Canada took over a year, with operations finally beginning in April 2023. WestJet Cargo started with three converted freighters, adding a fourth later that year, aiming to capture a share of the robust air cargo market and provide new revenue streams alongside its recovering passenger business.

The pandemic also saw numerous reported cases of COVID-19 on board WestJet flights, adding to operational complexities. The airline had to temporarily suspend service to Mexican destinations like Cabo San Lucas and Puerto Vallarta in early 2009 due to the H1N1 influenza outbreak, providing a precedent for managing health-related travel disruptions. During the 2013 Central and Eastern Canada ice storm, WestJet had chartered an Atlas Air Boeing 747-400 to transport stranded passengers and luggage from Toronto to Calgary, demonstrating its capacity for large-scale operational responses to crises. By February 2022, a majority of the employees laid off during the pandemic had been successfully recalled as travel demand began to recover.

Recent developments and current operations

In the years following the pandemic, WestJet has articulated a strategy focused on affordable air travel and a renewed commitment to its Western Canadian roots, with Calgary firmly positioned as its global connecting hub. The airline has continued to expand its sun destination network, operating up to 1,252 weekly flights on 88 unique non-stop routes between Canada and Latin America and the Caribbean during peak winter seasons. However, it has also made network adjustments, such as officially suspending all operations to Cuba in February 2026 due to a severe aviation fuel shortage in that country. This suspension followed similar actions by other Canadian airlines and affected destinations like Varadero and Cayo Coco that WestJet had served since 2009.

Labour relations have been a prominent feature of recent operations. The airline's cabin crew, represented by the Canadian Union of Public Employees since their certification by the Canada Industrial Relations Board in July 2018, and its pilots, represented by the Air Line Pilots Association, have been engaged in contract negotiations. In 2026, the company put forward a tentative agreement to its cabin crew that included a 13 percent wage increase effective October 1, 2026, with a 2.5 percent increase proposed for each subsequent year through 2028 and a retroactive payment to January 1, 2026. The airline's workforce has largely been recalled since the depths of the pandemic, though some layoffs were reported as recently as February 2026 as part of ongoing corporate restructuring.

Its operations are supported by key subsidiaries: WestJet Encore for regional travel, WestJet Cargo for freight, and Swoop as its ultra-low-cost carrier. The airline promotes its WestJet Rewards loyalty program and co-branded credit cards with RBC, offering benefits like companion vouchers and free checked bags, and it maintains a broad network of vacation packages through WestJet Vacations. The company continues to advocate for a coherent national aviation strategy in Canada, emphasizing the sector's importance to the country's economic future, as stated at events like the IATA Aviation Day Canada in October 2026. WestJet's leadership has changed several times, with Ed Sims replacing Gregg Saretsky as CEO in March 2018, and the company now operates under the ownership of Onex Corporation.

Questions about WestJet

When was WestJet founded and when did it start flying?

WestJet was founded on June 27, 1994, by a group of entrepreneurs including Clive Beddoe. The airline's first flight took off on February 29, 1996. That inaugural service operated with a Boeing 737-200 aircraft, connecting cities within Western Canada. The airline began with just three aircraft, 220 employees, and five destinations.

Where is WestJet headquartered and what are its main hubs?

WestJet is headquartered in Calgary, Alberta. Its primary global connecting hub is Calgary International Airport. The airline also utilizes Toronto Pearson International Airport as a major strategic secondary hub. Historically, the airline used John C. Munro Hamilton International Airport as its initial focus for eastern Canadian operations before shifting more capacity to Toronto.

What subsidiaries does WestJet operate?

WestJet operates several subsidiary brands. WestJet Encore is a regional airline that flies De Havilland Canada Dash 8 Q400 aircraft, often serving smaller communities. WestJet Cargo operates a fleet of converted Boeing 737-800 freighter aircraft for dedicated cargo services. Swoop is the group's ultra-low-cost carrier, launched in 2018, which operates Boeing 737-800s with a focus on very low base fares.

Does WestJet fly to Europe?

Yes, WestJet operates scheduled flights to several European destinations. The airline launched its first transatlantic service in 2014, flying seasonally from St. John's, Newfoundland to Dublin, Ireland. It later added service to Glasgow and, in 2016, began flights to London's Gatwick Airport from multiple Canadian cities. Seasonal service to Paris from Halifax also commenced in 2018.

What was the reason for WestJet's fleet being grounded in September 1996?

WestJet's fleet was grounded in mid September 1996 due to a disagreement with Transport Canada over maintenance schedule requirements. The airline suspended all service for two weeks as a result. After this period, flights were resumed. This was an early operational challenge for the young airline.

Sources: Wikipedia and current public reporting, checked by the Yadude Books desk. Last updated 2026-10-21.