London Luton Airport: Profit more than doubles ahead of expansion
Profit at London Luton Airport more than doubled in 2024 ahead of major expansion plans being signed off by the government.
The airport has posted a pre-tax profit of £89.8m for its latest financial year, new accounts filed with Companies House show.
The total is up significantly from the £39.9m pre-tax profit London Luton Airport achieved in 2023.
The new results also show the airport’s revenue grew from £296.5m to £304.4m in the year.
Over the same 12-month period, the average number of people working for London Luton Airport increased from 778 to 908.
The results come after the government approved expansion plans for the airport which will see the number of passengers flying in and out to surge to 32m per year by 2043.
The go-ahead was granted in June after plans were announced two months earlier for a new Universal theme park near Bedford.
London Luton Airport joins Gatwick and Heathrow expansion push
London Luton Airport is owned by Luton Borough Council, through economic development company Luton Rising, but is operated by LLA, a separate company.
The airport was boosted in 2024 by the news that it had been chosen as the latest base for Jet2.
Last month, Chancellor Rachel Reeves backed Gatwick Airport’s £2.2bn second runway plan.
In the privately-financed project, the West Sussex airport will move its emergency runway 12 metres north, enabling it to be used for departures of narrow-bodied planes such as Airbus A320s and Boeing 737s.
This will enable it to be used for about 100,000 more flights a year.
The Gatwick plan was given the go-ahead by transport secretary Heidi Alexander.
This summer, Heathrow’s top brass tabled their proposal to manage the hub’s long-awaited third runway expansion in a bidding process that will pit it against a rival operator for the first time in the airport’s history.