Has British Airways thrown Alex Cruz under the bus?

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• Nick says:

  17 May17 May 09:55

  What Alex wanted was the same as Michael O’Leary used to say about longhaul… to become effectively two airlines in one. In other words, have a premium product (and price) up front and a very non-premium product (and price) down the back. He didn’t make it work, and totally failed to take colleagues with him so it was doomed to failure, but he did at least make his vision clear. He doesn’t get the credit he deserves for investing heavily in the premium end… and investors totally did back him while he was in position. So yes, he has been thrown under a bus.

  • WaynedP says:

    17 May17 May 10:19

    The extent to which Alex Cruz was merely throwing his support behind an emerging development in air travel would explain the documented popularity of premium economy.

    If the price extremes of airline seats are diverging to the point where leisure travellers aren’t attracted by either, then there’s fertile ground for a middle-of-the-road offering.

    • The Savage Squirrel says:

      17 May17 May 13:40

      “If the price extremes of airline seats are diverging to the point where leisure travellers aren’t attracted by either, then there’s fertile ground for a middle-of-the-road offering.”

      Perfectly put. I’d be interested to see if this is perception or reality – have average Biz seat costs as a multiple of average economy costs stayed the same, increased or decreased over time. Basically has a typical biz seat always been around x5 economy price ( very rough approximation – obviously varies massively by both airline and route), or did it use to be a different ratio; or but have no idea where you’d research that.

• Mike says:

  17 May17 May 09:57

  A lot of the cuts were associated with Cruz, mainly because he enthusiastically announced them. It therefore makes sense to associate the reversal of those cuts with Cruz leaving. I see nothing unusual or surprising here.

  What you have here is a marketing exercise of collating everything they can to differentiate them from budget airline (a task that was harder a year or two ago). Tied with a new broom and the loss of a bit of a hate figure.

• ankomonkey says:

  17 May17 May 10:00

  Does Doyle’s track-record show that he managed Aer Lingus as an upmarket brand? I think he ran it as slightly more than an LCC, but I’m not too knowledgeable on this matter, so happy to be corrected.

  I think Cruz probably made some bad decisions at times and he didn’t do much positive to the customer experience, but I think he’s probably taken a lot more flack than he deserves. The profits during his tenure were good from what I remember.

  • Rhys says:

    17 May17 May 10:15

    Aer Lingus is positioned as the LCC brand vs BA and Iberia, though. And Sean Doyle wasn’t there very long – about 19 months.

• r* says:

  17 May17 May 10:12

  ‘BA no longer forcing ppl to take them to MCOL to get their legal rights’ strangely seems to be missing from their list of proposed improvements lol.

• Leo says:

  17 May17 May 11:19

  This is the Mail and Alex Cruz is Spanish. I don’t need any more explanation…
  (Even though your article and your explanation was excellent!)

  • Bagoly says:

    17 May17 May 11:45

    I think you are right.
    Have they done anything similar on Lloyds after Horta-Osorio left?

• Bagoly says:

  17 May17 May 11:53

  Fear not: Airportr has not increased its prices to £150!
  Some addresses are £24, although there does seem to be much more variation than pre-Covid – E.g. Oxford is from £69, although that does include up to 4 bags.
  I doubt they have any spare cash for advertising, but perhaps you could get them to offer a prize of a free collection for an article explaining changes to their offering leading up to 21st June.

• Susan says:

  17 May17 May 12:07

  Geordie Greig angling for his BA Prem card.

  • RussellH says:

    17 May17 May 12:46

    The article is in the MoS, not the DM. Geordie Grieg moved from the MoS to the DM some time ago.
    The byline on the article is “Harriet Dennys” – not a name I have seen before.
    I suspect that a BA press release may well have turned up on the desk of a new, very junior staffer who was told to turn it into something “useable”.
    Most newspapers do not have a proper transport correspondent (ie someone who actually understands what they are writing about) these days.
    Which is why the Sunday Times gets Rhys to write something that actually requires real knowledge of what they are writing about.

• Adrian says:

  17 May17 May 12:41

  It’s hard to believe how far BA has fallen for a bottle of water and a packet of crisps to be an “upgrade” (which indeed it is). Also there only 20 odd planes with CSuites fitted, what will it take 3-5 years for the rest?

  • Rhys says:

    17 May17 May 12:44

    2024 was the original plan, but that may well come sooner as the 747s have been retired early.

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