On Thursday, November 28, KLM Royal Dutch Airlines officially opened its completely renovated non-Schengen Crown Lounge at Schiphol Airport. Thanks to the outstanding service it provides, the new lounge offers visitors an unforgettable experience, new food and beverage ideas, and innovative technologies.

KLM’s non-Schengen Crown Lounge, the lounge’s official name, is located between the E and F piers at Schiphol. The “KLM House” is immediately noticeable by its illuminated glass wall adorned with some five thousand Delft blue miniature houses. Visitors to the lounge take the escalator to the top and embark on a journey back in time past these iconic World Business Class gifts. Personal lounge assistants welcome them into the house. They can gain quick access by scanning their boarding pass at the self-service machines. The white marble lounge desk takes the shape of a giant KLM logo and the lounge offers a great view of the runways, piers, and the KLM fleet in the background.

Double Crown

KLM’s non-Schengen Crown Lounge capacity has doubled in size. “The lounge now covers an area of 6,800 square metres with about a thousand full-free-service seats,” says Eelco van Asch, Senior Vice President, KLM Ground Services. “What’s more, there are about two hundred exclusive seats in the Blue Bar and Restaurant with equally exclusive levels of service. Customers can pay with their Flying Blue miles there. By doubling the capacity, KLM is taking our expected growth in visitor numbers into account. It’s quite a great feat. We are offering our customers and those of our partner airlines an unforgettable experience – a crowning achievement to our hundredth anniversary.”

KLM’s non-Schengen Crown Lounge reflects the airline’s image: comfort, customer focus, and innovation. New food and beverage ideas, digital support such as self-service access, and the lounge staff service all contribute to the personal experience. The online Lounge Guide offers visitors a constant digital assistant to help them find their way around, book services, check flight details, or request personal assistance from one of the Personal Lounge Assistants.

Concept

KLM wants to offer customers a completely new experience through its innovative service concepts. Working with the architectural firm ‘concrete’, the airline has designed five different “Dutch landscapes” to meet the varied wishes and needs of its customers, whether they want to work, relax, refresh, eat, drink, find entertainment, or engage in fine dining. The 5 landscapes are:

In the Polder landscape, customers can work ideally and relax at the same time. The carpet, decorated in varying shades of green, is reminiscent of the Netherlands’ vast pastureland. And a 110-metre LED light wall simulates the Dutch sky. The lighting adapts to the time of day and includes a beautiful sunset.

In the lively City landscape, customers can enjoy “live” cooking, a Heineken Bar, specially designed by Heineken, and a coffee bar with a barista. The new food and beverage concept – characterised by stylish, high-quality, and fresh seasonal products – comes from KLM’s partner Vermaat. Reducing waste is an important pillar for both companies to lounge catering.

The Sea offers everything customers need to recharge their batteries during their journey. The area has twenty free showers, which customers can reserve in advance at the lounge’s self-service kiosks. The luxury sleeping cabins offer privacy, tranquillity, and comfort – for a fee – using Flying Blue miles, or three hours for EUR 49,50. It’s the perfect place to close your eyes and rest during a transfer or a long journey. In the future the showers and sleeping cabins will be equipped with digital allocation systems using QR codes.

The striking Dutch Mountain zone offers visitors a variety of options for working and having fun, from a TV room to a DJ stand for special events. It devotes attention to Dutch design and offers historical attributes from KLM’s heritage.

Sky is an exclusive and original area on the second floor. At the explicit request of KLM customers, Sky’s high-end setting offers a terrace with a beautiful view of Schiphol Airport. You can enjoy excellent meals and a wide range of drinks in Blue by KLM, a restaurant and adjacent bar for an extra fee. Blue’s menu is compiled by Joris Bijdendijk of RIJKS®, the Rijksmuseum’s Michelin-starred restaurant. Blue offers a fantastic gastronomic experience, carefully considering individual timing and personal needs.

Entry

KLM welcomes to its non-Schengen Crown Lounge:

• Business Class passengers;
• Flying Blue Platinum and Gold members plus one guest (additional guests on payment);
• SkyTeam Elite Plus members plus one guest.

KLM also wants its customers and those of our partner airlines who do not have automatic lounge access, to be able to benefit from the Crown Lounge. They can do this by purchasing access in the KLM app, at KLM.com, at the self-service machines in the airport, or at the entrance to the lounge – depending on their destination and lounge capacity.

KLM non-Schengen Crown Lounge offers:

Ø  Showers, paid sleeping cabins, and virtual reality cabins;

Ø  A terrace overlooking the runways;

Ø  Online Lounge Guide, Self-service kiosks and Personal Lounge Assistants to help customers.

KLM Royal Dutch Airlines has made this announcement:

KLM Royal Dutch Airlines is the first airline in the world to recycle PET bottles to make tools for repairing and maintaining its aircraft.

Empty bottles are collected at the end of every flight and transformed into filament, the material used in 3D printers. This process means an empty water bottle can end up as part of a 3D-printed piece of equipment that saves Engineering and Maintenance time and money.

In the same way normal printers use ink, 3D printers need filament to print with. KLM used to buy this material from external suppliers. But now empty PET bottles from its flights are delivered to a recycling company in exchange for high-quality plastic pellets, which are the main material in filament. The tons of plastic bottles that are taken off aircraft at Amsterdam Airport Schiphol every year are recycled into this filament. 

3D printers at E&M

KLM Engineering and Maintenance has been using 3D printers for quite some time in ways that speed up repair and maintenance processes. For example, special plugs have been developed to ensure that rim holes don’t get painted over when the wheels on Boeing 737s are painted.

Protective tape is no longer used at Engine Services during the maintenance of turbine blades. It has been replaced by a 3D-printed cover. And the tool Engine Services designed for removing overhead baggage bins on board the Boeing 787 means this task can now be carried out by one mechanic instead of two.

Lower cost of filament 

E&M currently uses around 1.5 kg of high quality filament every day. Because KLM now supplies PET bottles as a raw material, the cost of this filament has dropped from EUR 60/kg to just EUR 17/kg. By working with the recycling company Morssinkhof Rymoplast and the filament manufacturer Reflow, KLM is now able not only to be innovative in its use of 3D printing, but also to make the process circular.

Reduce waste 

KLM aims to reduce the volume of its waste by 50% in 2030, compared to 2011 levels. This will be achieved by producing less waste overall and increasing the amount that can be recycled. In 2018, KLM reduced waste by 9% and 28% of what remained was recycled.

By Marco Finelli reporting from Amsterdam.

KLM, is 100 years old. It is by far the first airline to do so. Pieter Elbers – President and CEO of the carrier wanted to underline it “we are the first and only original to achieve this result without having changed our name”. A clear thing that Elbers wanted to point out “Like yesterday and how it is today and it will be for the future KLM has thought big since the early days. Only after 4 years did the first intercontinental service opening a service to  Batavia (now Jakarta in Indonesia) and then Curaçao later, the first freight services and in 1946 the first carrier to open a passenger service between Europe and the United States with a flight to New York, up to the first country to sign an Open Sky agreement with the USA”.

From these results Elbers indicated that KLM is always innovative, looking to the future to be a carrier in step with the times. Elbers said on this “global competition is absolutely a present factor, you have seen in the last two years how many carriers have disappeared from the scene”. You can’t stay behind. Challenges must be fought every day, keeping up with the times. 100 years after its foundation, the company is always at the forefront with the profusion of all the more than 30,000 employees who in all areas of the carrier continue to work so that KLM produces high standards, expansion and above all positive financial results. Major investments in the last two years on digital both as customers care and as a company.

Over 28 million followers on social media, more than 143 million visits to the website and over 19,000 multimedia devices in the hands of employees. 2018 was a memorable year as the presentation indicates. KLM saw over 34 million passengers on board of its aircraft. Seven regional Embraer 175s entered the fleet and three Dreamliners on long haul. It carried 620,000 tons of goods all over the world in the holds of its own aircraft and 7 Boeing 747 Combis and three Boeing 747-400F freighters. He celebrated the achievement of the 99 different ceramic houses built by the prestigious Royal Delft.

In 2018 it opened four airports, three in Europe such as Vaxjo, Marseille and Nantes. In the long haul Fortaleza opened. In total there are over 160 airports now served and more than 800 with those of all partners. KLM’s business has an impact of over € 30 billion, over 300 thousand indirect jobs, in addition to the already said over thirty thousand in the Netherlands, the second largest company in the country “.

Schipol, the carrier’s hub in a nation of 17 million people, has enlivened over 71 million passengers in 2018 and is the third most important in Europe. “It is not technically saturated, it has reached the limit set by the local authorities of half a million movements, but in the future it will rise to 540000, it is not known when” so said Elbers. “KLM has four main markets – says Elbers – they are USA, China, Brazil and Canada “. KLM benefits from an important connectivity from various markets thanks to Air France, Delta and in the future from Virgin Atlantic”, which recently the British airline has become part of Blue Sky, the alliance that in addition to the Paris airports, the American ones and in the future London will be a way of further connectivity with more possibilities to reach many markets. In example Brazil is an important market for KLM, 25% of our passengers continue the journeys with partner GOL.

Virgin’s world network comes to mind as well as Caribbean destinations not served by Air France and KLM. Elbers stressed “the opening of Austin for next year and the network shared with Delta is a strategic condition impossible to forget”. The future is also in the hands of technology of sustainability at the level of aircraft that consume less, such as the gap between 1970’s Boeing 747 and today’s Boeing 787. But also the use of bio fuels as it will be today towards the future. In the cargo side the biggest and excellent bulk available on Boeing 777-300ERs are the future change and replace of the today venerable Boeing 747-400s Combi freight today in fleet with 7 jets. The 18/27 tons available on each ships can be compared similar with availability on Boeing 777s

In addition to the electrical technology being developed with research institutes. KLM continue to support with her know how the new possibility of sustainable new airplanes. “We do not build aircraft, but we help them build them with our global operator know-how,” said Elbers. But KLM does not grow only for air transport, Elbers refers as a great company captain and excellent motivator “today and tomorrow is in the hands of our collaborators, at all levels, from high level to low level profile. Everyone is able to keep a company at a high level, from flight personnel to ground personnel, from IT to technicians ”. A winning message deliberately shown by a winning carrier.

All photos by Marco Finelli.

KLM Royal Dutch Airlines, the world’s oldest international airline still operating under its original name, marked its 100th anniversary yesterday. This auspicious occasion was celebrated with a spectacular event, attended by the Minister of Finance, Wopke Hoesktra. He, along with customers, partners, Air France-KLM executives, and staff from various divisions, looked back on 100 years of KLM history and forward to a sustainable future.

Hangar 10 was the backdrop to the “KLM Experience”, where guests were treated to an impressive overview of KLM’s past, present and future. This included an in-depth look at KLM’s development over the decades and the role it played in international civil aviation.

“The fact that we are celebrating our 100th anniversary is not just testimony to a century of successful enterprise, innovation, and commerce, but also to the faith that customers and partners have in KLM. It is an ode to KLM’s aviation pioneers, who literally put civil aviation on the map worldwide. KLM is the oldest international airline still operating under its original name. We were the first airline to successfully pursue partnerships and alliances, after which many other countries and airlines followed our example. This has brought together hundreds of millions of people around the globe. As Albert Plesman put it: “The ocean of the air unites all people.” We may take pride in our long list of achievements and efforts over the past 100 years. And so we stand – energetic and confident – on the threshold of a new century. Filled with the same pioneering and enterprising spirit, we look forward, with optimism, to taking on the challenges of sustainability and innovation.” – Pieter Elbers, KLM President & CEO.

“You feel at home aboard a KLM aircraft. Wherever you are, when you’re with KLM, the Netherlands feels close by. Together with Schiphol, KLM is of great importance to our global connectivity and hence to employment opportunities in the Netherlands. The world is no longer the same as it was 100 years ago, but the pioneering spirit of Albert Plesman is still very much alive at the company. I wish KLM a wonderful centenary and a successful, innovative, jet-setting future, in which the company will join hands with Air France in achieving their superb share objective to become Europe’s best airline.” – Finance Minister of The Netherlands, Wopke Hoekstra.

KLM’s 100th Delftware miniature

In keeping with tradition, today KLM marked its anniversary with the presentation of a new Delftware miniature house; a moment eagerly awaited by faithful collectors all over the world. This year’s miniature is a replica of Huis ten Bosch Palace in The Hague, the home of King Willem-Alexander and his family. Today the first copy of KLM’s 100th Delftware miniature house was presented to Finance Minister Wopke Hoestra by KLM President & CEO Pieter Elbers.

Huis ten Bosch Palace was built in the mid-17th century at the behest of Prince Frederik Hendrik of Orange and his wife Amalia van Solms. It was extended in the first half of the 18th century by Prince Willem IV. After Willem I was crowned King of the Netherlands in 1815, the palace was regularly home to members of the Dutch royal family. Since January 2019, Huis ten Bosch Palace has been the residence of King Willem-Alexander, Queen Máxima and their three daughters. The palace also serves as a ceremonial venue.

“To me, Huis ten Bosch Palace symbolises the special bond between KLM and the Netherlands and the fact that we have borne the predicate Royal for the past 100 years. It is, therefore, a point of pride and honour that our 100th Delftware miniature is a replica of this very special building.” – KLM President & CEO Pieter Elbers

Since the 1950s, KLM has presented specially designed Delftware miniature houses to World Business Class passengers on intercontinental flights. The houses are replicas of monumental buildings throughout the Netherlands. The number of houses in the collection has kept pace with KLM’s anniversary since 1994, with new miniatures added to the collection on or around KLM’s anniversary on 7 October.

KLM book

KLM will also mark its centenary with a special book titled Welcome Aboard – 100 years of KLM Royal Dutch Airlines. The first copy was presented by KLM’s current Board of Managing Directors, Pieter Elbers, René de Groot and Erik Swelheim, to three former KLM presidents, Pieter Bouw, Leo van Wijk and Peter Hartman.

KLM festivities everywhere

Today, KLM staff worldwide shared special treats in honour of our 100th anniversary. There was cake and a special message from Pieter Elbers. In addition, all KLM staff will receive the coveted 100th KLM Delftware miniature house and have been invited to attend the “KLM Experience”. Over the past weekend, KLM staff in their thousands were immersed in 100 years of KLM history. Many thousands more will gather this weekend, to undergo an unforgettable experience, featuring a wide array of events, shows, and activities.

Today, October 7, KLM celebrates 100 years since its foundation:

The establishment of the ‘Royal Dutch Airlines for the Netherlands and Colonies’ as it was then called. The founders were a group of investors who asked Albert Plesman to take up the daily supervision of the business. Plesman would later be named Director of KLM.