Planned to fail ? Surely not !
As a start up would you - if you had a commercial type brain do the following;
1. Advertise in such a manner that nobody could work out what duo.com actually was. A picture of a DUCK - no routes or anything alluding to it being an airline.
2. Not have a call centre and relying on the on-line bookings. Not every body has the internet. Also not being registered with Oporto / Expedia etc.
3. Deciding to paint the 5 (I think) CRJ 200's at around £20,000 a pop even when they were being returned to the lessor in about 6 months !!!
And of course the return conditions being 'a white repaint'.
4. Also fitting out the cabins of the 200's in leather and new trim/carpets. Another waste of money we did not have. Word to the wise - keeping BEIGE carpet clean during the winter on walk up aircraft is totally impossible.
5. Considering the whole BA database of passengers was contacted (allegedly) about duo operating the routes, we were flying with 2 or 3 passengers for many flights which were operating at 50%-60% load factors prior to the mis-managment buyout.
Explain to me why it took so long for the CAA to grant the new AOC – did they have concerns about the financial side?
If Maersk had closed the airline all employees would have received a full redundancy package + shut down costs etc - an expensive process, an estimate was £40 million.
Based on the assumption that the airline never made any money and never will –
How about paying a few directors to take over the airline and dissolve the previous owners of liability for the redundancy/shutdown, the directors walk away happy after the 'unexpected' demise leaving the rest of the workers up the creek with no paddle.
I'm really sure that didn’t happen as the directors were all very kind, considerate human beings - but they must have been very clever or total imbeciles at –
1. Bean counting as no effort was made to cut costs, if fact thousand were spent on aircraft which were leaving the fleet.
2. Advertising - 'When did you last feed the ducks' - 'When did you last fly to Geneva' would have been better.
3. Contacting previous passengers - If duo were the only airline on that route why were we flying 2's & 3's ?
I leave you to your own conclusions – but I think BMI employees had better take a look at the new joiners to their company, its surprising how the same names pop up!
Gravity’s a myth – the earth sucks!