Stagecoach Gold was a luxury bus sub-brand used by various Stagecoach bus subsidiaries in the United Kingdom.
Stagecoach Gold (originally Goldline) was launched in 2007 and was designed to attract more middle-class passengers to choose bus travel as a method of transport as well as to reward passengers on some busy and popular routes.
Stagecoach West currently runs the most Stagecoach Gold routes, nine, as of August 2022. Stagecoach Midlands owns the largest number of Stagecoach Gold branded vehicles with 63 in its fleet as of August, 2023.
As part of a makeover of its UK business, work began in February 2020 on the removal of Gold branding in some cases by withdrawal of the routes or transferring services to other operators.
History
The Goldline brand was introduced to try to win more middle-class motorists to bus services. The brand was initially trialled in both Perth, using Alexander Dennis Enviro300 single-deck buses, and Warwick, using Optare Solo midibuses, from November 2007, both on routes which received Kickstart funding from the Department for Transport to help establish the routes. Stagecoach East Scotland invested £300,000 to demonstrate the idea to politicians.[1][2]