Being an avid Aviation lover and I chose this as my Career from the early 1970's
Growing up with my first flights on British Eagle, BUA, Caledonian, Air Spain, Court Line, Wardair, Monarch, Laker,
Donaldson BEA Airtours, British Midland, Air Europe, you name em' !
and then ended up working with some of them...
I've always thought that if I won the seriously big Mega Millions on the Lottery would I like to start up my own airline in the UK ?
If I did (I likely would be quite mad I hear you all cry) then I would like to look at starting an Airline that goes back to basics offering Passengers a decent product, and showing them some respect.
IE; Hold Luggage and seat allocation included, hot meals on flights sat in a Comfy seat, all with decent leg room.
The thought of starting a 'Leisure' airline was always my desire, but these days here in the UK there are few non-integrated Tour Operators left who you could sell seats and a charter series to.
That's sewn up with both TUI and Jet2 Holidays.
Excel, Monarch and Thomas Cook are gone, as are all of the UK's main charter airlines from the past 30 years.
Although Thomas Cook Scandinavia lives on as Sunclass Airlines, whose roots go back to the 1960's with Scanair and Conair, and they still use their old call sign 'Viking and same DK flight code.
Condor Germany still lives on too, with a strong loyal brand.
Foreign outsiders in more recent years, such as Small Planet, Germania, Smartwings, and then Enter Air all have picked over the bones of what was left in the UK Holiday Charter Market.
So yes, just maybe I would be quite mad to think of starting up a UK Holiday Airline.....