Star Alliance member Croatia Airlines is under a lot of pressure in its home market of Croatia. Although Ryanair has not yet been able to start the full Zagreb program due to a lack of staff at the subsidiary Lauda Europe, the top dog is already feeling the pressure.

Croatia Airlines is now adapting its strategy and wants to base more aircraft at other Croatian airports or establish non-stop flights as part of the W-Pattern. An example of the latter form are the flights that are offered from Osijek. Initially, a de Havilland Dash 8-400 and an Airbus A319 will be stationed in Split.

According to the current plans, it should not stay that way, because the intention is to be present in the 2022/23 winter flight schedule. In the past, flights from Split, Zadar and Dubvrovnik were characterized by strong seasonality. That should change, at least in the first city mentioned, because Croatia Airlines wants to establish a whole range of year-round routes. A larger-scale expansion from Split has been announced for the 2023 summer flight schedule. This is at the expense of the presence in the capital Zagreb, because there one is under strong pressure from Ryanair.

The strategy that Croatia Airlines is now adopting is quite risky, because there are also many low-cost airlines at Croatia's secondary airports. Especially in summer there are only a few gaps that have the potential to be operated profitably. Where there is money to be made, Eurowings, Easyjet, Ryanair and other providers have long been sitting on it. Thus, finding year-round niches for Croatia Airlines will by no means be an easy task.

For the time being, five new routes are to be added from Split. These are to be served with two aircraft stationed on site. These are a Dash 8-400 and an Airbus A319. New one wants to fly to Milan, Dublin, Bucharest, Amsterdam and Stockholm. Some of these routes already existed before the pandemic, but from Zagreb. Many years ago, some of these destinations were served non-stop from Split, but these were discontinued as the Zagreb hub strategy took hold.