TAKING to the skies in new tartan livery which is either glorious or garish depending on your point of view, Loganair undoubtedly found a new lease of life in September 2017 when it began flying under its own banner after 25 years of franchise deals came to an end.
What the airline clearly didn’t expect was for its old partner Flybe to launch routes which it had previously operated with Loganair before their long-standing franchise agreement ended with a certain degree of acrimony last summer.
And now Loganair has conceded that the competition will likely lead to a loss in the year to March 2018. After coming back strongly from a series of service and punctuality problems which led to the First Minister raising concerns, it seems perhaps unfair that Flybe has not been given clear skies in which to make a name for itself.
But adapting to an evolving market and new competitors (with bigger airplanes and shorter flying times from Aberdeen to Lerwick) requires sharp thinking. To their credit the management team at Loganair have responded quickly, with a restructuring programme that will soak up losses on the routes where it has been in competition.
With Flybe now scrapping three of the six routes it launched with Eastern Airways – arguably confirming Loganair’s view that competition is unsustainable in such a limited market – Loganair will now perhaps see more gentle headwinds once it flies its way through tickets to Sumburgh which have been sold for the next six months at competitive prices.
Lest it be forgotten, the company has just seen revenue pass £100 million for the first time, and has used its new routes to grow passenger numbers by 8.6 per cent.
So the company which brands itself as “Scotland’s Airline”, may end its next financial year nursing some bruises, but in a stronger position to continue providing the service which it has been working on providing since last summer.
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