Virgin Blue changes course in battle to bag top flyers

[pauly7]

IT IS the question John Borghetti is quickly becoming renowned for asking anyone he bumps into: ''Do you fly Virgin Blue?'' The airline's new boss wheeled it out again this week at a lunch for 300-plus executives and hangers-on in a Sydney hotel.


The 37-year airline veteran was slightly taken aback when only a small number of business types put their hands up. ''There's a bit of work to do, isn't there?'' he laughed sheepishly.


Just days earlier, on the eve of Virgin Blue's 10th-anniversary celebrations in a Melbourne hangar, Australian and US regulators had dealt two telling blows to his bold new plans aimed at moulding Australia's second-largest airline into an upmarket competitor to Qantas.


Virgin Blue changes course in battle to bag top flyers




Very interesting and factual (not no news sensational) article.

 

[StevePER]

Insiders say Borghetti, 55, would not have taken on the job if he had to effectively buy the corporate market through heavy discounting because, quite simply, Virgin Blue does not have deep-enough pockets.
He accepted it on the basis that he did not have to give corporates 20 per cent discounts on fares to gain their custom. To do otherwise would have been the kiss of death.

Strange, as far as I can tell Virgin Blue did buy my company's business by giving us a fairly significant corporate discount.