Closing bmiBaby will damage the brand?? Closing the Glasgow route did far more damage, and BA thanked them very much for it. The Baby brand is not so strong that removing it will have any significant impact.
I would suggest that a slow reduction in fleet size is the more likely option rather than out right closure
Dont bet on it. A financial calculation can be made and if it works out cheaper to make a clean cut rather than slowly bleed to death, that is what will happen.
they unlike us have access to all the data and will have known what is coming on a day by day basis more over they will know to the penny what the non fuel costs are and whether the business is trending in the right direction excluding volatile fuel cost.
It doesnt take a genius to see which way things are trending - and I can guarantee that DLH have a much better idea of that than the management in Donington Hall. DLH don't do knee jerk and I would be willing to bet a beer that they have been planning a strategy for loss mitigation for a few months now. If baby can't make a success of MAN there is something significantly wrong at the core of the organisation.
Just because British Midland has been around for a long time does not give it some sort of magical protection. It has suffered years of lack of investment and poor management, and Lufthansa are now trying to make the best of what they were landed with, don't forget they did everything they could to get out of the deal with Bishop. So you are being very generous to give them 18 months to fix what is very very broken.
I am not saying any of this to be spiteful, but when it comes to running a business, sentimentality plays a very small part in any decision - if at all.
Lungi Man makes my point for me. The numbers don't lie and DLH management are more than sharp enough to make the comparison. There will be strategic changes, and sad to say, they will be painful.