Monarch 4
 

Looks like toledoashley and others were right, if this story is correct... Monarch eyes long-haul shift amid ATOL talks

Now its out in the open, I heard Greybull want to sell. Bids had to be in by Friday, with no buyer looking to purchase it as one entity. Jet2 were looking at buying the bulk apparently - short haul network, but not the holidays division.

What with the Boeing order Jet 2 seem the obvious choice.
Easy could integrate the Airbus fleet now probably and get the slots at LGW and LTN which would be advantageous but what of the 737Max order placed.

Pity the staff again, looking at re-structure. Getting a bit monotonous every year thinking what kind of job will i have by Christmas.

Absolutely agree.

Poor staff yet AGAIN, while the top floor continues to expand with more 'experts'
Sadly I think the clock is ticking if this is the best the owners can come up with.
Wonder what odds you can get on ever seeing a max in MON colours.

Shame on those that caused this. You know who you are.

So if things are that bad,why have Monarch been holding interviews for cabin crew in the last fortnight?

I don't think the situation is bad, just that Greybull have got restless at not being able to make a big enough return with low cost short haul.

I have watched this site since I became a part of the engineering division in 2013. There have been ups and downs, but a restructure isn't always bad news. A restructure at my previous place of work got me into this great company and whilst working at BHX we have grown and grown.

We might not work on super shiney new jets, but a stable future is what we want, and if there is a restructure it may enhance that. I spend most of my time working props and if we need to work on these so the company can go into long haul then so be it! 737's are an old design but I think if we were to get stronger together with a regional airline that can do the short haul stuff, we can grow on the long haul stage and they can feed us

If only ......
 

...... Monarch had £1 profit for every time it had done a root and branch review of its business there would never be these problems. I mean seriously wasn't the great White knight 2 years ago culling charter and becoming a lean low cost operator? What's happening with that?
If talk of long haul is serious then I fear for the future of the business.

For those who doubted me, my source was from a rival airline who had been approached for a takeover of the short haul business.

I can see a tie-up working, but my question mark is what is defined by pivoting to long haul.

I don't see where they will go with long haul unless they have sold capacity to someone who needs it. Anyone got ideas I can't see.

Can see a sale of he short haul business with slots being the main motivator plus removal of competition in a market with excess capacity.

My sense is that the whole leisure travel business is turning soft, and I see trouble ahead.

Doesn't a airline need long haul aircraft to operate long haul routes ..

This is Monarch. Anything goes. Expect the MAXs to turn to 787's or something equally barmy.

I suppose they could argue that the max given its range is a long haul aircraft:eek:

I'm pretty confused by this. Wouldn't a takeover of the short-haul operations just be a takeover of the company as they don't have any long haul business?

Also, they don't have any long-haul aircraft and the MAX's won't offer them much more range.

Jet2 don't seem to be keen on acquisitions, so maybe EasyJet, Thomas Cook, TUI, Ryanair or Norwegian?

I don't think the story leaked today is the full picture...

Monarch should never have totally ditched their previous long haul operations. In a head to head fight with Ryanair, Easy jet & others, Monarch were never going to find the cheap short haul market easy. I wish them well.

The story has stopped people talking about the deep seated problems of Ryanair for a few minutes

Long-haul would not have saved Monarch, not on the scale they were running it. (2 A330's, 1 A300?) It would have needed to be quadrupled in size to perhaps been profitable, but the financiers would never have taken that risk. TCX took the risk on the long haul strategy, and it looks like it has worked for them....so far.

Monarch was a very nice airline, questionably profitable :), but is now becoming another possible victim of our avaricious UK public requiring stupidly low fares. And of course they line up with other elements of our avaricious UK public, perhaps wealthier, who require excessive and unfeasible returns from their venture capital investments.

Greed will eventually fail and reality will force fares back into line, but at the expense of a number of airlines and their pilots, but lining the pockets of the managers overseeing their failures.

More examples spring to mind...

RoyHudd,

What a depressingly perspicacious post.

This site is so full of arrogant self centred egotistical clueless dickheads it provides fantastic amusement to read!!! :)

Bring on the revolution :)

Agree entirely, 100%. Total sign of the times. If only the masses woke up to it, however the phrase Nero and a Fiddle spring to mind....

So the poor staff at MON are now subject once again to the annual debate about their future as yet another bunch of consultants , no doubt at huge expense, come up with yet another plan ( remember no charter --no Longhaul --go all Boeing )
My understanding was that the refinancing last year was based on the sale and lease back of the imminent B737 MAX -so how can you sell the short haul business without taking delivery of these aircraft ?
As for Longhaul , sure you could probably operate ex a few MON UK bases to the east coast with a MAX but is that enough ? If they are being offered a deal on B787 by Boeing -where is this market that Norwegian - BA -VS -TCX etc haven't yet got into ?
The MON staff are great people and deserve better .

When is the ATOL license due and how much will that cost?

Early October I believe but what's rumbling behind the scenes seems much bigger than the ATOL renewal! Good luck to friends and colleagues at Monarch.

ATOL renewal should be 30 September

This is ridiculous. When things were starting to look up and quite positive for the company, the management come up with some bizzare idea yet again. Long haul really is NOT the be all and end all! Especially as the market continues to become more and more saturated, things can quickly start to become messy again. After all there is only so many destinations a Max can reach from the UK too.

Monarch should be happy at what they've got and what they have managed to turn around for now. They should be focusing on developing this further with the new aircraft and a streamlined fleet. Giving them the chance to open up new niche routes, mainly on short/mid-haul and focusing more on working closer with Monarch Holidays to make routes even more profitable.

At best they could have opened up the long haul market ex-BHX with the Max's and had no competition but Primera got in there first. The Monarch brand would have worked so much better ex-UK too.

As for a partnership, Flybe could be the best bet as a feeder airline. Offering direct onward connections from all but LTN of Monarch' UK airports. Inparticular this would have the potential to work well from BHX and MAN to destinations where BE don't usually venture in to and opening up new markets for their customers...

Hopefully the media reports are just poorly worded and don't show off the bigger picture in what is being "planned". However, Monarch need to be releasing some clearer details soon as yet again negative press and rumours will start to put people off. It's extremely unfair for the brilliant staff and respected brand.

Only a month ago Sky were talking about this.
British Steel rescuer Greybull eyes swoop on ailing Alitalia

Far more likely to be a tie up with easyjet than flybe...

Concentrate on Long-haul? This company changes direction more times than a wonky compass. No long haul planes, never done any decent long haul in the past anyway. They'd be competing with Thomson who have it down to an art and TCX who are growing LH year on year especially up north. All Monarch are doing is pitching an idea. Investors don't invest in ideas.

I wondered a while back if they could have a co-op deal with FlyBe - with Monarch running sun routes and flyBe taking over some of the city routes...
Not interlining, as that wouldn’t make sense - but certainly working together on marketing, scheduling and route development.

Merge it with Jet2

Jet2.com does seem the most logical choice with the Boeing fleet, bases at LBA, MAN, BHX...

Long haul isn't the answer, ask ex Globespan employees, good short haul operation killed with long haul operation problems.

Monarch gave up L/H many moons ago with their pair of elderly A330's and the 4 long in the tooth A300-600R's which saw service to MCO/SFB Maldives Goa Banjul Mombasa Cancun and the Caribbean,
supplemented by the 757's for Agra and Kerala - all via BAH

OM/MON took over BCAL's old Golden Lion routes to the Caribbean and I think did quite well on those, plus had lucrative cruise ship charters with P&O and Fred Olsen also to the Caribbean.

The lone wolf DC-10 was used to good effect to Orlando mainly from MAN and was a handy people mover to the Med and the Canaries (like all of the other MON L/H fleet were used too)

Now the Global stage has changed drastically both in currency dips weak £ and loss of many holiday destinations due to the political and security problems in places like Kenya (Mombasa) Egypt Israel Tunisia Gambia - even Thailand is no longer a 'safe' bet.

An old fav like MCO/SFB Florida which OM/MON plied since the late 80's first with 757's then A300's via BGR surely now with such a weak £ v the $ would not be a sensible set up.
BA Virgin TUI DY and TCX dominate all of Florida, with even EI Icelandic and WOW offering cheap fares via points from LON

TUI have started MRU along with Condor - Virgin Atlantic gave that route up quite quickly as they could not compete with BA, Air MRU EK and AF

Norwegian/DY have now entered the USA and Global Long Haul stage big time not just to the USA but many other destinations with their brand new 787's from LGW.

Legacy full service carriers such as BA KLM LH (and Emirates for instance) have entered onto many of the L/H leisure routes such as the Maldives Cancun MRU CPT and now the Seychelles. Folk from MAN and the regionals can now access direct flights or via Euro and ME hubs

OM/MON used to have good L/H charter contracts with UK tour operators such as Kuoni Red Sea Holidays Hayes & Jarvis and Voyages Jules Verne to the Maldives Goa Jordan Gambia and Egypt but many of those have bit the dust such as Tapestry and Jewel in the Crown where MON also operated to specialised destinations such as Kerala Aqaba and Agra.
Mombasa is a dead duck and the Maldives is too expensive now as a ''charter'' destination.
As an aside Kuoni did own Edelweiss in Switzerland

TCX have been operating LGW-CPT last season non-stop with 3 a week on A330's
that's a big operation and I wonder how they faired?
Also sister Airline Condor is also part of the act with flights to CPT from LON MAN and UK regionals via FRA and MUC plus anywhere on their vast L/H route network via Germany.

so as you can see either somebody at Monarch is either a fool or very very brave (and in the know) also very very upbeat that they can re-enter the L/H arena -
BTW where are the planes coming from??

indeed - see my long post above --- and not to mention Norwegian cleaning up out of LGW on L/Haul worldwide - (not just TUI and TCX/Condor)

If they are going back into long haul then they must have some sort of plan and an idea of the market they want.
With the MAX they could look at US East coast from NCL GLA/EDI CWL BRS BHX MAN LBA LTN and LGW.
Same airports with a wide body but to places like Florida the Caribbean and the US West coast as well as Asia. From some of those cities they'd have competition but from a lot of them they wouldn't or the competition is very light.
They may well have identified gaps in the market that they can fill.
I wish them luck.