A sizeable amount jumped before they were pushed and dont forget 35 crew from DUB being forced out. It just shows how Lufty run things and if it saves the company then i'm all for it.

Is bmi now using british midland international as part of their advertising campaign?? i aks because i've seen 1 lonely poster in LHR with it under the main bmi logo and on one of my flights the flight supervisor intrdoduced by saying " on behalf of bmi, british midland & british midland international we would ......" talk about confusing you brand!!

How many guys at bmi mainline have taken up the Offer of a place with Qatar or any other operator?

Yes we are using bmi-British Midland International now.

Yep, bmi British Midland International now, dare I say it, but common sense seems to be creeping in and maybe a sense of direction!?? i.e. profitable Midhaul routes, 'neighbourhood flying' for our lufty stable mates e.g. lufty wet lease, Swiss wet lease, thin Brussels Airlines routes being operated by bmi regional, and route 'sharing', i.e. VIE and apparently now HAM, CGN and maybe DRS...who knows!! and maintaining a basic UK and Ireland feeder too....

I've also heard that Star is keen to establish some LHR-MAD feed and upset BA/IB's monopoly...so maybe sharing LHR to MAD and BCN with Spanair???

Who the devil knows!

Yep, bmi British Midland International now, dare I say it, but common sense seems to be creeping in and maybe a sense of direction!?? i.e. profitable Midhaul routes, 'neighbourhood flying' for our lufty stable mates e.g. lufty wet lease, Swiss wet lease, thin Brussels Airlines routes being operated by bmi regional, and route 'sharing', i.e. VIE and apparently now HAM, CGN and maybe DRS...who knows!! and maintaining a basic UK and Ireland feeder too....

I've also heard that Star is keen to establish some LHR-MAD feed and upset BA/IB's monopoly...so maybe sharing LHR to MAD and BCN with Spanair???

Who the devil knows!

Midland used to fly to DRS ten years ago or so...before it became bmi...so it sounds like it's coming full circle (at least with that route).

This is interesting when you followed the VC-union pilot strike recently at LH (which went down after one day, mostly due to very arrogant behaviour of the union leaders, overlooking labour laws in Germany), but this is exactly what they feared: Less and less LH operating into UK, more and more taken over by bmi. Wouldn't even be surprised if BHX-FRA would become partially bmi. BHX-DUS and BHX-MUC are already non-mainline-LH (Cityline and Eurowings), which are mostly outside of the VC-union's influence. Wouldn't mind a modern A319 instead of the aging B737, honestly. Oh, DRS ? Great destination, but no profitable market (tried and failed by BA recently) all demand goes nicely via FRA, plus DRS is too close to SXF (2h drive). FR's Saxony airport also is not so far from DRS.

Re: Star Alliance flights in-out of UK
--about bloomin' time! - The company line in the past has been that we can't operate between 'x' & 'y' either because they don't think they can make a profit, or because of an existing Star carrier on the route. Well, times are tough; I've just seen a lot of good guys forced out with the threat of redundancy if they didn't jump. Pretty much every Star carrier in europe comes into LHR; it's about time bmi put themselves on more of those routes to bring some revenue our way, not just to let the routes be served from the 'other end'. We're probably the cheapest labour now if a comparison was made. (not that I'm proud of that)

If you want brand confusion look at the departure board for a BMI, or whatever it's called today, flight from say London to Glasgow, about 10 different flight numbers on it, takes up a whole screenful for one flight.

That's called code-share, it is up to the airline/airport to decide if they want to show all the flight numbers on the screens. If you display all flights it takes an age to get back to the operating (BD) flight , if you don't then you have customers staring in confusion at the screens looking for which desks to check-in at. Your are damned if you do and you are damned if you dont, This problem is not unique to bmi.

It's even more schizophrenic than usual at the minute. The airline has about 7 brands, British Midland, bmi british midland, bmi, flybmi, bmi British Midland International and so on. Just pick one and stick to it!

To me the new branding is a mouthful "bmi British Midland International, in association with our Star Alliance partners..."

I've never understood why codeshare needs to show all these dfferent flight numbers, with the confusion described, and elsewhere, why exactly the same codeshare benefits cannot obtain if the UK flight shows just BD123 instead of BD123, LH4567, GF 8910, etc, etc, especially as tickets then have to say "this flght is actually operated by BMI" if the code is different. What a good thing it doesn't carry forward to ATC callsigns !

Not totally off-topic for the BMI thread here as they steadily position themselves more as a Star feeder rather than an O&D operator.

Unfortunately the vast majority of itineraries do not have the "operated by bmi" line and even if it does , customers do not read it :ugh:

In fact im sure most people, if the aircraft is on an airbridge dont have the faintest idea wot airline they are on nor even care

The 5 brands mentioned is hardly 7.
British Midland was the old name for the airline, before being rebranded to bmi british midland & then finally bmi.
Flybmi is the website address only.
bmi - British Midland International is now being used as years later people still think bmi & British Midland have no relation.

So let me get this straight. There once was an airline called British Midland which was well regarded by its customers, provided a decent standard of service and didn't do too badly financially.

It then decided to start flying to the USA and because Midland, Texas sounds about as far away from civilisation as you can get, the name "British Midland" was deemed unsuitable.

The name was changed to bmi British Midland and then bmi. Great idea - far more acceptable in America. Name your airline after the acronym for body mass index. I suppose it's an acronym which at least is instantly memorable for part of the American population.

bmi then starts losing pots of cash. They then start reintroducing the "British Midland" bit because no-one really knows what bmi is or what it stands for, despite the efforts to establish the brand having continued for what - about eight years?

How's about another re-brand. Just call it British Midland. I think the powers-that-be could be amazed at the effect which this would have.

Bookings for BOH-jER has been good according the our airprt director,

Confused - you will be
 

bmi's business plan was always a bit like the clues in 3-2-1 with dusty bin.

I worked for this airline previously, one season it was Eastern Europe - flying to Warsaw, Prague and Budapest. Next season "hey Scandinavia - LHR - CPH< OSL, next season, Rome,and Milan, next season, Madrid and Barcelona.


When they unvield the new name, at a staff breifing, Marketing said, they wanted bmi be as catchy as "IBM" for example.

In the brand ideologies, they actually said "We're not Beligan Chocolates, we're Kit-kats, British! "

Very Very poor business vision, at one time running A321 between Edinburgh/Glasgow to London in a C140Y34 config !! and filling C section !

Got a copy of this months Voyager today and indeed at the bottom it says bmi, British Midland International.

Skip Rat
Comparisons on cheapest labour can be difficult because of pounds to euro calculations, depends on the euro rate used. (comparison excluding any social benefits etc)