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Hi Matt, and thanks for offering me the chance to share my side of this. You may not like my answer to this, but here goes. First up: the Executive Traveller article was published around 6.30pm yesterday (see ), so I don't know about it being published "2.5 hours" after the AFF article because...

Yeah, I found the $20 limit was under my usual lunch so I started inviting my girlfriend to a lot of lunches during Shop Small! :P The $10 limit will be easier for me to work with when flying solo.

Yeah, maybe to allow for that this promo allows for more redemptions (as noted earlier, $10/$5 x 10 rather than the previous $20/$10 x 5) although I never had much trouble hitting the Shop Small ceiling in a few weeks! The amounts work okay for me, covers two coffees and a banana bread in the...

Can't be 'traded' to NH, if Virgin Australia lets it go then QF could bid for it. Original plan was to have double-daily SYD-HND to replace 1 x B747 but given current market, who knows if that'd still be needed or if QF might want to make BNE-NRT into BNE-HND?

There's also a new My Gold newsletter (I kid you not!) with $30 off Qantas Wine, so that's $10 again less than Platinum. Up next will be the My Silver newsletter with $20 off Qantas Wine, My Bronze newsletter with $10 off Qantas Wine... just as well there are no tiers below Bronze, or those...

Sorry Doc, source was QF itself, this info shared with me before the site was updated and emails went out to Qantas Frequent Flyer members, but those emails should be hitting inboxes by now.

Pretty much what it says in the subject line.

Jostling and positioning by Virgin bidders is getting really interesting. Cyrus reportedly blowing the full-service trumpet, but domestic fleet pared back to B737s...

I believe (and again, could be mistaken) that BNE's Sumo Salad was run by the some company which held the management contract for Virgin's BNE lounge, hence a logical connection. That said... 1. If I was to choose a 'franchise' for a light healthy not-messy economy meal to pick up at the gate...

Speaking of leased Virgin Australia aircraft... Virgin Australia administrators have reached in-principle agreements with aircraft lessors covering the bulk of its fleet to wait until after August 31 to repossess planes Lessors would normally be able to repossess planes from June 19, which is...

it was reportedly tabled as an “optional extra”.

Agreed. The model is proven across Europe. The key would be determining the price point (and broader product offering) at which Virgin could still expect to win over enough business class travellers, especially corporates, from Qantas, to make this work. One of my big areas of interest in the...

100% speculation from the peanut gallery here, but I also come down on the side of hybrid (never was a fan of the 'new-world carrier' terminology), middle-of-market positioning. If Virgin 2.0 wants to take on Qantas it'll need lounges on the ground and some form of 'premium' product in the air...

Quite correct in all that – my statement was a simplification of how Virgin 2.0 could be closer to profitability than Virgin 1.0.

Hahahaha! Flynny was my school nickname so no drama there!

On meals: I wouldn’t even offer any meal on most of the triangle routes. At what other time and what other occasion in your life can you not go for 2-3 hours without a meal? When airports these days have so many catering options and F&B outlets which are generally so much better than they were...

On the subject of LCCs - I know some have suggested that Virgin Australia could down the road launch its own LCC, wouldn’t have to have the Tiger brand, could just be ‘Virgin Express’ for argument’s sake - but I fail to see how this could achieve anything but cannibalise its parent airline and...

The theory is that Virgin Australia could be and indeed would be profitable if not weighed down by debt and if it could negotiate more favourable contracts (from pilots to leasing, WiFi, suppliers etc), and that the administration process could achieve this, pretty much wiping out debt and...

Oh please, don't give any of the bidders any ideas about how low their low-cost airline can go. "G'day and welcome aboard AussieBlue, your true-blue airline. I'm Captain Davo, up the front is head sheila Shazza, give 'em a wave Shaz, there's a girl! Now we're hopin' for a really quick flight...

As were the first-name greetings. I mean, I am not a stickler for formality but when somebody who has never met me before and will probably never meet me again says "Hi Dave!" – well, apart from the fact that NOBODY calls me "Dave", I do feel that Mr or Mrs or Ms is the correct approach for service.