A few have said they were surprised by this and I was too... I think Virgin might be as well, judging by the fact that it's nearly 48 hours and still no response or comment on their media page.
I think it's a great move and now gives a decent alternative for QFF that don't want to fly JQ domestic in NZ but instead, can now fly on an NZ operated aircraft with QF flight number and benefits... for us QC Members also good news.
I think Virgin have no one but themselves to blame really... the company left the hands of Brett Godfrey with a couple hundred million dollar profit and has not made one since under current management. I know for a fact that Air NZ had terrible problems if say, they had a diversion, in getting Virgin to seamlessly take the passengers - significant pushback on the use of FIMs and the like and literally led to Air NZ simply giving their disrupted passengers to Qantas. Unfortunately, as Virgin have nice crew and some good people on the front line working for them, they are being run by people who know nothing about reality in aviation - you can't expect to play with the big boys and refuse to cooperate. This complaint about misconnections and disrupted passengers is not isolated to Air NZ either - the problem is that while Virgin have good people and their Business Class trans continental on the A330 is brilliant (but IMHO so is Qantas'), the people running the show - many - have been in the industry for 5 mins and the company has made many 'beginners mistakes' - on top of this, there is talent in Virgin but those with knowledge, experience and ability are constantly driven out - I know several people who have had this happen. What this does is result in phenomenally DUMB decisions such as adopted SABRE rather than retain Amadeus Altea DC as their system, refuse to engage in many cases in the most basic industry norms - even when to Virgin's advantage such as being gifted disrupted passengers - then arguing from head office for hours about paperwork and/or the dysfunctional system making it almost impossible for staff to handle the situation. Very sad because the senior management have been drawing significant salaries and bonuses and the airline has gotten worse (no, I don't count the piddling $4m profit off $2-3bn revenue as a turnaround).
Short story, because of the difficulty of working together where Air NZ passengers were often shortchanged from what I've heard but when Virgin had a problem, Air NZ was expected to drop everything to help (including with pouring money in), Air NZ finally had enough and decided their 20-30% shareholding and the money tied up in it was better spent on product and aircraft for Air NZ. The other difficulties I think just helped Air NZ make the decision. I mean why bother, they can now keep the money and codeshare with Qantas who has a bigger domestic network anyway and is pretty efficient at handling things like NZ's disrupted passengers and leaving the paperwork until later.
I just don't know from a business perspective how long the management of Virgin can keep their jobs. It might be an idea to have a complete clean out and put some front line people with ability into the roles. We should have two strong competitors in this market but at the moment we have one strong profitable airline and one circus act (certainly from the management perspective) which is a pity because they could learn from each other.
Who would have imagined 5 years ago that Qantas' costs would be lower than Virgin's and Virgin unable to make a return.
I just hope this creates a shock wave at Virgin and they sack their management and put people in with ability and a bit of guts, rather than arrogance and gall.
I am a Velocity Member and was a Lounge Member and also am a Qantas Club and QFF Member so I'm not playing favorites here. I just can't understand how the product is so good (except in economy) yet the company can't make a profit, can't make a decision and the senior people keep being paid bonuses - on the share price alone any other executive would have been out the door years ago. I know QF's share price was down, but we knew it had cash and a good debt/equity ratio. It just beggars belief that a Board allows this to continue.
Not sure how many more hits like this VA can take.