[rferguson]

I have to admit I am still amazed that people still poo poo BA for being London centric. There has been thread after thread after thread on here and other forums. BA is in the business to make money. Does anyone really think that if BA had the slightest inkling that it could make good money by flying a longhaul route from Manchester or Glasgow etc etc it wouldn’t do it? It has nada to do with BA feeling some particular allegiance to London or deliberately snubbing anywhere else in the UK – it’s pure utilisation of its resources in the best and most profitable way it can.

People question why the likes of the ME3 fly to other UK cities while BA doesn’t. The simple answer is that BA is doing exactly the same as the ME3 when it flies from Bilbao or Naples or Toulouse to London – it is feeding it’s hub.

Does anyone not question why Air France does not fly routes like say MRS/LYS/NCE – LHR whilst BA flies these routes? Because again, AF is doing the same as BA does in the UK. It focuses on transporting british passengers from various UK ports to its longhaul hubs and flying them onwards. Just as BA does with secondary cities in France and the UK.

I’m not aware of AF having much of a longhaul network out of any other cities other than Paris.

LH has a dual hub city approach and that works for them. Their two hubs are both economic powerhouses. Compare the population of Munich with Glasgow or Edinburgh. Compare the GDP of Munich and Manchester.

SK has a limited longhaul network that focuses on CPH. However it is the ‘national airline’ of three completely separate countries so I guess there is a political obligation to have at least some longhaul routes from the capitals of those other countries. ARN only has two longhaul routes and OSL only one.

The fact is these other airlines construct their route network according to what is profitable for them. The same rules do not apply in every market for every airline. If BA thought that it would get a better return basing two 777’s at MAN versus LHR they would be shipped up there tomorrow.

Announcement of the 787-9 routes won’t be until middle of JUL.

[MrMichael]

@rferguson, as usual you make absolute sense, and I am a regular on here defending BA as a business that can only make business decisions that show a return on investment and resources.

However, what the heck else can I do to persuade BA to operate a SOU-Mad route 😉

[Gold-2K]

I vaguely remember someone speculating on BA starting a LHR / Portland service. Any possibility with a 787? I seem to bump into a lot of people doing the same routing as me connecting thru SEA.

[sparkyflier]

Gold 2K I suspect Portland would be on a short list of about 5 for next US routes.

RF – + 1 – very eloquently put as always.

[Bath_VIP]

RF +1

Every legacy airline these days feeds its hubs and only its hubs. Some airlines have more than 1 hub but these are mainly in the US where the size of the country justifies that.

In Europe you need to look at the holding companies not the airlines to find out where their hubs are. For IAG, they are LHR, MAD & DUB (soon). For AF/KL, they are CDG & AMS. For LH, they are FRA, MUC, ZRH, VIE & BRU. For me these are comparable in quantity to the hubs of the DL, AA & UA in the US.

The difference between the US & EU is simply the fact that the airlines serving each hub tend to be different which is mostly due to the fact that Europe is not a single country (and is not likely to be in the next 100 years or so either!). Having said that, at some point I think the airline identities will start to merge in Europe.

So to answer MrMichael’s question, don’t lobby BA, lobby IB. It is IB’s job to fill the MAD hub from SOU.

[KarlMarx]

rferguson – 01/07/2015 22:33 BST

I have to admit I am still amazed that people still poo poo BA for being London centric.
___________

I am not poo pooing BA for being London centric – that is a business decision and it may be a good one.

What sticks in my craw is the blatant use of the British branding, when the reality is that they do not fly to international destinations from any country other than England and in particular from London.

It is misrepresentation in my opinion and not acceptable.

British means pan the three nations (England, Scotland and Wales.)

[rferguson]

@ karlmarx – interesting points.

I’m not british and do not even come from an english speaking country. My ‘national’ airline is SAS 😉 So perhaps i’m not qualified to comment.

I think ‘national’ airlines and ‘flag carriers’ are all things of the past in reality. Any airline can fly the british (or english or scottish or…) flag and deem themself a flag carrier.

I’m no expert on the political composition of Britain/UK/England which ever is the official name lol. I know some parts of the country are definitely more patriotic than others! For example when home in my country I always notice that people from england will identify themselves as from ‘the UK’ or as ‘britsh’. When someone from Scotland is asked the answer is 99% of the time from ‘scotland’ or ‘im scottish’. I don’t think Britain has the same kind of constitutional make up as say Scandinavia? We are three separate countries. We make all our own laws. We have our own militarys. We don’t have a ‘capital of scandinavia’. But yes we have one airline that flies all our flags.

London is the capital city of the UK/Britain. This I know 🙂 It’s also the largest and the economic powerhouse. British Airways flies to all the countries of the UK (except wales). Three cities in Scotland. One in NI. Four cities in England. I’d think that alone makes British Airways worthy of the name.

I guess it depends how far one is willing to go. Let’s say BA changed it’s name to England Airlines. And people from Manchester and Newcastle say ‘hang on a second – we have no long haul routes. You have no right to call yourself England Airways. You only represent London’.

It would be like saying Air France is not worthy of the name as the bulk of it’s operation is out of Paris even though cities the likes of Marseille have nearly double the population of Edinburgh, Belfast or Glasgow and Lyon a population on par.

Or Caribbean Airlines having to change it’s name because it flies to nowhere near all the caribbean countries.

Or that Virgin Atlantic is not correctly representing itself as it flies eastwards as well as across the atlantic. The fact is if Virgin could change it’s name to ‘British Branson Airlines’ or ‘Virgin British Airways’ tomorrow. But like BA, it knows the strength of a brand.

A new airline could launch north of the border with dual hubs in Edinburgh and Glasgow and call itself Airline of Britain and it wouldn’t be a misrepresentation.

[Bath_VIP]

RF +1 again. Completely specious argument by KarlMarx. By the same token, KLM should be Royal Holland Airlines.

[KarlMarx]

RFerguson

I’m sorry, but I cannot be bothered to respond to such an ignorant post (ignorant in the true meaning of lacking knowledge.)

Bath_VIP

KLM translates literally as ‘Royal Airlines’ and reflects the fact that Queen Wilhelmina awarded the airline this honorific title.

By your logic, the Royal Society in the UK should be the Royal British Society, the Royal Mail should be the Royal UK mail etc. Utter nonsense.

[1nfrequent]

Karl – gotta say I can never work out when you’re being serious and when you’re just trolling. Ah well. Instead of worrying about it, I’ll just appreciate the irony of a poster using a German name to complain about BA using British branding … 😉

Regarding the new BA long haul routes, I thought the speculation was that the routes would be more US focused?

1F

[FCTraveller]

KarlMarx, maybe you cannot be bothered to respond because rferguson is absolutely right and I think you’ll find that a few other people agree with him. But in any case, your use of the word “ignorant” is uncalled for. Please be respectful of other people’s opinions. If you don’t agree with someone, don’t make it personal. This is not how we do things here.

[MarkivJ]

Semi off topic, in relation to the discussion we’ve had about BA and the Indian market strategy. Scroll to the last graph – Lufthansa is the only EU airline in the international carriers, and it’s grown by 6%.

http://www.anna.aero/2015/06/30/indigo-close-grabbing-40-indian-domestic-market-delhi-passes-40-million-passenger-milestone/

[rferguson]

@ KarMarx, What a disappointing reply. Firstly, being so uneducated, I don’t understand what ‘ignorant’ means. Is it similar to ‘arrogant’?

Secondly, perhaps you can use some very small words or perhaps draw a picture for me so I can understand why you say it is a ‘misrepresentation in my opinion and not acceptable’ (sorry too many big words in that sentence for me) for BA to use the branding British Airways?

Perhaps a reason other than ‘when the reality is that they do not fly to international destinations from any country other than England and in particular from London.’ Yes call out the Trading standards immediately! Jeez, they have loads of flights to Scotland and N.I and their main engineering base in Wales.

Like I say – i’m not british. I have no allegiance or patriotism to any of the british countries. I’m looking at this from a purely objective perspective.

BA is not the ‘designated flag carrier’ or the ‘designated national airline of the UK’. Because no such thing exists in the UK. Fact is, it has the name British Airways because it got to the name first. Do you really think ‘BA’ as an airline should disappear in markets in the US or Asia where it has good brand recognition and change it’s name because it doesn’t have an international flight from all the british countries?

Why don’t we just go back to the days of fixing airfares and designating routes for airlines so BA can restart EDI – FCO or GLA – JFK and do so profitably and be worthy of the British Airways name.

[canucklad]

I’m going to enter the fray……..
As always rferguson, your comments are measured, respectful and on many occasions educational. So I certainty don’t consider you ignorant, having said that I do have issue with BA being able to use its dominant place in the UK market to monopolise its position.
And, although, not a “Designated” flag carrier, it’s history has allowed I’s management team to conduct it’s business, in a manner that feels like it still has full government protection and intervention if things go wrong.
I totally get, the London Hub model, and although it would be nice, for them to make a go of other routes from my local airport I fully appreciate the business sense of driving customers through its LHR hub.
What sticks in my throat, with the British tag, is that EDI-NCL-ABZ-GLA-Man are all still part of the UK, yet BA sacked all their ground staff at these airports and outsourced them. Yet didn’t do so at LHR !!

[rferguson]

Hey canucklad. It’s so nice when posters can respectfully disagree without resorting to names 🙂

Thanks, I do like that you consider me measured when it comes to most things BA. I am far from a fan and they would not likely be my first choice of airline on most routes it operates. On the flip side, sometimes I think the criticisms are a bit over the top.

Former ‘national’ airlines always seem to pull at heart strings for people. Many Brits are no different to us scandis when it comes to SAS or the Aussies Qantas. Many of us ‘love to hate’ or in many cases resent their inherited ‘designated flag carrier’ benefits of years gone by.

Does BA receive any special treatment because it’s BA? Maybe. If it does I don’t think it’s out of any special protection for BA as a ‘national airline’ status. I think any special treatment it gets is from its leverage as a huge company and employer in the UK. No different to a large bank or insurance company. I also think the preferential treatment afforded it by the government is much less than say the U.S. Carriers who enjoy Chapter 11 protection. Or LH or KL who’s governments are moving to restrict access to the ME3. BA is afforded no such protections. If it didn’t make it out of its post 9/11 so called ‘fight for survival’ I honestly believe the UK government would not have stepped in to save it. Instead, a new airline/airlines would have likely been reborn along the same lines of Brussels Airlines, Swiss International or Olympic.

In fact the ‘protections’ of the legacy carriers can bite them in the bum when it comes to competing in an open market. Any new airline start up today would from word go likely have a call centre off shore, contract ground staff and poor T&C’s for its own staff. They will never likely go through the backlash of closing a call centre or outsourcing its employees. They will also likely not have pensions the size of Jupiter to fill in from the bygone era, aircraft that are old and no longer efficient due to poor and excessive selections in the past etc.

Yes you are also right that BA has closed and outsourced a lot of its operations in ‘the regions’. Airport staff in GLA/EDI/MAN. Call centre staff in GLA and NCL. But let’s not forget a lot of this has happened in London too (at LGW). It is a path that most of the ‘legacy’ carriers have taken – outsource nearly all non-hub ground staff. Why didn’t BA do it at LHR? It certainly wasn’t because Willie Walsh loves LHR staff. If he honestly believed that outsourcing LHR ground staff was cost effective for the airline he would have done it overnight.

One also has to consider what to do with the staff coming from these roles. Ground staff numbers from EDI/MAN/GLA can pretty easily be absorbed into other available roles. Many of the cabin crew serving you on a Worldwide legacy fleet flight today are ‘redeployed’ ground staff/call centre staff who took the long haul cabin crew option (as it allowed them to still reside in their home towns and commute). The numbers of ground staff at LHR are so great that they would be difficult to absorb in the same manner. And the cost of redundancy would be weighed up against the cost savings.

Saying that, the U.S. ground staff were also kept ‘inhouse’ until recently when they have all been given notice that outsourcing is likely. LHR is not immune in the long run. It has taken the same approach to cabin crew recruitment – recruiting new staff on much lower pay scales and inferior T&C’s.

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