LIFT chief marketing officer, Charlene Meltz, accepts award on behalf of the airline. Picture: Supplied
South Africa’s youngest airline, LIFT, was recognised as the Best Low Cost Airline in Africa at the prestigious 2024 World Airline Awards hosted by Skytrax in the United Kingdom.
The airline also made history as the youngest airline in Africa to have won a World Airline Award.
According to LIFT chief executive Jonathan Ayache, they’re absolutely thrilled to receive their first-ever Skytrax Award.
“Winning the ‘Best Low Cost Airline in Africa’ is a huge feat for our domestic airline that has been around for just shy of four years.
“This is a testament to the amazing service our team provides, but also serves as recognition of the broader business model. We are clearly making a mark by providing travellers with our elevated experience and industry-leading flexibility.
“Thank you to our amazing travellers for this vote of confidence,” said Ayache.
The World Airline Awards were introduced in 1999 to provide a customer satisfaction study that is truly global, and let travellers across the world vote in the largest airline passenger satisfaction survey to determine the award winners.
This year’s online customer survey, operated from September 2023 to May 2024, saw over 100 customer nationalities participate in the 2023/2024 survey, with 21.42 million eligible entries counted in the results.
More than 350 airlines are featured in the final award results, with LIFT bringing home the top award for “Best Low Cost Airline in Africa”.
Congratulating LIFT on it’s achievement, Skytrax chief executive Edward Plaisted said being named the best low-cost airline in Africa was a fabulous achievement.
“This is a remarkable success for an airline that is less than four years old. This recognition of service and hospitality should be a source of pride for the management and staff of LIFT,” he said.
The World Airline Awards are wholly independent and impartial, and all costs of the survey and awards event are paid by Skytrax. Airlines do not pay any entry or registration fee.
In addition, there are no charges for the use of the Award logos and results, making the awards true, earned awards.
A key directive of the survey is for customers to make their own personal choices as to which airlines they consider to be the best, underlining the brand as the Passenger’s Choice Awards.
Since taking to the skies, LIFT has been trailblazing and collecting awards in the aviation industry.
The airline has received two other awards this year, including the Best New Airline Brand, South Africa Award 2023 from Global Brands Magazine (GBM), in January, and the Intelligent Aviation Implementation Award from Intelligent ICT Awards in May.