Increased revenues by over one billion – E24

Now the company fears increased costs and a weak krone.

After some troubled pandemic years, the charter market was back on top last year.

The tourism company Ving Norge itself writes that in its annual accounts for 2023.

The turnover ended at NOK 4.05 billion. This was an increase from 2.63 billion the previous year. The result before tax ended at NOK 87.22 million, which is over NOK 60 million more than the previous year.

The company points out that the financial year 22/23 was the first with normal operations after three years affected by the pandemic.

In 2019, Petter Stordalen picked up Ving Norge and Sunclass Airlines together with two acquisition funds after the Thomas Cook bankruptcy.

Ving Norge sells charter flights to “southern” destinations and certain major cities, and according to the company itself controls over 40 percent of the charter market in Norway.

352,000 passengers traveled with Ving in the previous financial year.

Fears increased costs and a weak krone

But now the company is seeing signs of concern.

– Despite the fact that the demand for holiday travel is back to normal levels, the company has recently seen somewhat lower sales of travel. At present, the sales trend for the summer season is down around 14 per cent compared to the same time in 2023. The company has therefore adapted the flight program somewhat, they write in the annual accounts which were sent out on 19 March.

Ving operates with different accounting years, and the annual accounts thus apply to the period from October 2022 to the end of September 2023.

Furthermore, they write that increased costs as a result of rising hotel prices, and increased costs of airplane seats cause pressure on the company’s margins.

– We also get the same impact from continued high aviation fuel prices and a weak Norwegian krone.