Virgin Atlantic To Scrap Little Red

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Virgin Atlantic To Scrap Little Red

October 6, 2014 - Virgin Atlantic announced that it would end its daily flights between London Heathrow Airport and Manchester, Aberdeen and Edinburgh know as 'Little Red".

Little Red passenger service has failed to produce the passenger revenue that the career had anticipated on. It was launched in April 2013, after British Airways had to give up slots at Heathrow airport due to its merger with British Midland Airways (BMI).

Since its launch date, just over 18 months, Little Red has struggle to fill passenger seats, the carrier reported it will end the daily service to Manchester in March 2015 and services to Aberdeen and Edinburgh will end September 2015.

Little Red was operated by the Irish air carrier Aer Lingus for Virgin Atlantic with its crew and plane in Virgin Atlantic colors. Sir Richard Branson, Virgin Atlantic’s president said “the odds were stacked against us”. Virgin Atlantic reported that the majority of passenger demand on these routes were point-to-point customers rather than the connecting traffic it had hoped for, feeding more passengers onto its more profitable long haul routes.

Virgin Atlantic chief executive Craig Kreeger said “Little Red came about through an enduring passion at Virgin Atlantic to make a difference for our customers. We really wanted it to be a success and everyone involved worked extremely hard and has given it their best efforts.

“It was always a huge challenge on behalf of the consumer, as the totally inadequate number of slots made available by the European Commission did not deliver close to BA’s network position, even when supplemented by our own slots to fly between Heathrow and Manchester. The time lag between the takeover of BMI and our entering the market also meant Little Red initially faced an uphill battle to win recognition and convert customers to its services.”

Branson further stated “When the competition authorities allowed British Airways to take over British Midland and all of its slots, we feared there was little we could do to challenge BA’s huge domestic and European network built through decades of dominance. To remedy this, we were offered a meager package of slots with a number of constraints on how to use them and we decided to lease a few planes on a short term basis to give it our best shot. The odds were stacked against us and sadly we just couldn’t attract enough corporate business on these routes.”