Entirely based around wet lease, it conducted a mix of regional services for larger airlines and the military, as well as corporate, ad hoc and inclusive tour charters.

Established as Busy Bee Air Service A/S by Bjørn G. Braathen, the airline initially mostly operated corporate charters, using among other aircraft a Learjet 23 and later three Hawker Siddeley HS.125.

From 1975 it operated regional services for its sister company Braathens SAFE and increasingly flew charter for the Norwegian Armed Forces.

Reduced military charters and a loss of a vital contract in 1991 caused the foundation to fall out of the airline and it filed for bankruptcy in December 1992.

Ludvig G. Braathens Rederi alone was in such high demand for corporate charter that the airline could nearly fill one plane with that group alone.

[4] In December the Learjet was painted in zebra stripes and leased to a film company for the shooting of The Last Safari in Kenya.

A typical task would involve flying spare parts and technicians to a far-away port to make crucial repairs to ships, allowing faster reentry into revenue service.

With smaller capacity and higher frequency, Busy Bee was able to triple patronage within three years and brought profitability to the route.

[3] Due to disputes with the labor unions, SAS terminated parts of its contract with Busy Bee in March 1984.

Busy Bee was the regular partner of Gulliver, who contracted the Boeing to fly three weekend trips during the summer to Greece.

[27] During the late 1980s the Norwegian Armed Forces changed their travel procurement practices, shifting focus on chartering aircraft to instead buying tickets on scheduled flights.

[4] To compensate, Busy Bee increased its focus on European wet lease contracts, which it signed with among others NLM CityHopper, Austrian Airlines and British Midland International.

However, the company was able to downsize easily after 30 pilots resigned to work for SAS Commuter, which expanded its operations in Northern Norway in 1990.

[33] SAS and Busy Bee entered negotiations in November 1991 to look into the possibility of establishing a new airline, Norwegian Commuter.

[35] The company received 30 million kroner in new share capital in December 1991 and a two-year contract to fly routes for Braathens.

[36] The airline secured a contract to fly for the administration of Air Nordic out of Stockholm Västerås Airport to Sundsvall, Vasa, Gothenburg, Örebro and Oslo.

[4] The management started working during latter part of 1992 to create a contingency plan to continue operations past a bankruptcy.

[39] They made an agreement with Braathens to fly the West Coast regional routes, cutting the hourly cost from 17,000 to 12,000 Norwegian krone.

During the Air Executive period until 1980, the airline had a mixed white, blue and red livery, which brought it close to that used by its larger sister company.

Specifically, it was a combi variant, which encompassed a side loading door and the possibility to quickly rearrange the interior between all-passenger, all-freight, combined passenger and freight, as well as VIP configuration.