I remember taking a few flights with them in the 80s and there definitely was a different attitude amongst the workers, I imagine due to the fact that they were stakeholders in the company. My last flight with them was sometime in late 1986 from LGW to Newark. The 747 was empty, that is to say less than 50 passengers, everything seemed grubby and neglected from the check in to the inside of the aircraft and there was an air of dejection from the hosties and on that last trans-atlantic flight the service was awful.
Perhaps 'Frankie-boy' had already worked his magic behind the scenes and everyone was resigned to the inevitable. I seem to recall that you had to pay for 'everything' that was extra to the seat on the flights and I was a bit miffed by this at first
but got used to it. They were simply ahead of the curve and before their time. Such stakeholder airlines are always inspirational, but will IMO always be disadvantaged due to the political nature of the airline business.
The colour scheme was also very pleasant, a sort of Braniff lite.
regards
SHJ