Jeremy Clarkson on Virgin
Thread Starter
Join Date: Jan 1999
Location: London, UK
Posts: 144
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Jeremy Clarkson on Virgin
Looks like I'll have to pay more attention to the IFBTs...
Jeremy Clarkson: I've been seduced by Beardy Airways
The job of a newspaper columnist is to find something wrong with everything. To find discord where there is harmony. To sprinkle a little bit of hay fever dust all over the perfect summer’s day.
Unfortunately, it’s hard to find fault with something you love. And, strangely, one of the things I’ve loved most of all over the years is club class on British Airways. I love the way that when you’ve finished working in some godforsaken Third World fleapit you’re welcomed on board by a homosexual in grey flannel trousers and you think: “Aaaah. We haven’t even taken off but I’m home already.”
I love their scones and clotted cream. I love the way they have back-up planes for when yours goes wrong. And I love the calmness of their pilots, all of whom have abbreviated Christian names and reassuring three-syllable surnames. “Welcome on board, ladies and gentlemen. Mike Richardson here on the flight deck . . .”
Oh, they’ve done their best over the years to shoo me away, ditching the elegant grey and blue livery in favour of that terrible pre-Tony multiworld design on the tailfins, and then by buying the tedious and slothful 777 to replace the brilliant jumbos.
Even when I stopped flying quite so much and they demoted me from a card that entitled me to sit on the captain’s lap to a card that didn’t even get me into the economy class bogs, I still stayed loyal. And what happened when they ditched Concorde? Did I work myself into a frenzy of righteous indignation. Did I rant and rave? No. I blamed the French.
I chose to fly BA the other day even though I knew the catering staff were on a roundabout in Slough and there’d be no scones. To give you an idea of how devoted I am, the only request I made when negotiating my BBC contract was that I should fly BA whenever possible.
Last week, however, it wasn’t possible and I was sent upper-class tickets for a flight to San Francisco with the enemy. Virgin.
I’d flown once before with Beardy Airways and, having been told to put on the “funky phones” so I could hear the safety demonstration, I seriously considered opening the door and jumping out. It’s an airline, for crying out loud, not a playgroup.
Still, this time they offered to send a car to pick me up, which is something BA has never done. Of course it wasn’t the limo in which Helen Mirren luxuriates in the television commercials; it was more a sort of Volvo, in fact.
But even so, it took me to a check-in zone at Heathrow where, without even getting out of the car, my bag was checked in and my boarding card issued. That was impressive. And then I was escorted by a pretty, slim girl, which is what airline employees should be like, to the Virgin lounge.
My God. It was like walking into the Design Museum. The whole place was dripping with the sort of style that means you can neither open nor close the lavatory doors, and the wine’s Norwegian. It was fabulous.
In the BA lounge you get a cup of coffee and a biscuit and you help yourself. Here, there was a restaurant, bar staff, a smoking area that wasn’t just a glass box like you get at a zoo, a hairdresser’s, several massage parlours, some steam rooms, and a businessman on a mobile phone in a Jacuzzi.
He was unusual. When you fly with BA everyone has a laptop and models themselves on those idiots you see in airport poster advertisements for American banks. But with Virgin most of the passengers looked like the sort of people you might have round for dinner. One was the lighting director for the Eagles. Several were women.
I had a massage, which the girl said was like trying to ease the tension in a fridge door — this is because I’d been unable to get into the lavatory and was in agony — and then I rang the office to find out how much it was all costing. “Oh,” said the girl, “it’s about the same as BA business.”
That’s weird. Normally two similarly priced products designed to do the same sort of thing are roughly the same. A Ford is much the same as a Vauxhall. Evian is pretty much the same as what comes out of your tap. But the gap between Virgin and BA is planetary. And we hadn’t even got on the plane yet.
Superficially, it was the same as BA. They even had a homosexual man to welcome us on board, and scones, and seats that move around electrically. But on Virgin you have a girl in stockings and a suspender belt to give you another massage, and there’s a bar. And I mean a proper bar, on which you can loll.
What’s more, on BA you watch the films when they come on. On Virgin you are the master of your own destiny, thanks to technology that’s bound to break all the time. It certainly did on the way home, but because we were on a 747 the flight took less than nine hours. I therefore didn’t really mind.
So there we are. Finally I’ve found something wrong with British Airways. They’re not good enough. And now it’s time to put a superbug in Beardy’s omelette with a question. If you can make your airline even better than the best airline in the world, how come your trains are such rubbish?
Jeremy Clarkson: I've been seduced by Beardy Airways
The job of a newspaper columnist is to find something wrong with everything. To find discord where there is harmony. To sprinkle a little bit of hay fever dust all over the perfect summer’s day.
Unfortunately, it’s hard to find fault with something you love. And, strangely, one of the things I’ve loved most of all over the years is club class on British Airways. I love the way that when you’ve finished working in some godforsaken Third World fleapit you’re welcomed on board by a homosexual in grey flannel trousers and you think: “Aaaah. We haven’t even taken off but I’m home already.”
I love their scones and clotted cream. I love the way they have back-up planes for when yours goes wrong. And I love the calmness of their pilots, all of whom have abbreviated Christian names and reassuring three-syllable surnames. “Welcome on board, ladies and gentlemen. Mike Richardson here on the flight deck . . .”
Oh, they’ve done their best over the years to shoo me away, ditching the elegant grey and blue livery in favour of that terrible pre-Tony multiworld design on the tailfins, and then by buying the tedious and slothful 777 to replace the brilliant jumbos.
Even when I stopped flying quite so much and they demoted me from a card that entitled me to sit on the captain’s lap to a card that didn’t even get me into the economy class bogs, I still stayed loyal. And what happened when they ditched Concorde? Did I work myself into a frenzy of righteous indignation. Did I rant and rave? No. I blamed the French.
I chose to fly BA the other day even though I knew the catering staff were on a roundabout in Slough and there’d be no scones. To give you an idea of how devoted I am, the only request I made when negotiating my BBC contract was that I should fly BA whenever possible.
Last week, however, it wasn’t possible and I was sent upper-class tickets for a flight to San Francisco with the enemy. Virgin.
I’d flown once before with Beardy Airways and, having been told to put on the “funky phones” so I could hear the safety demonstration, I seriously considered opening the door and jumping out. It’s an airline, for crying out loud, not a playgroup.
Still, this time they offered to send a car to pick me up, which is something BA has never done. Of course it wasn’t the limo in which Helen Mirren luxuriates in the television commercials; it was more a sort of Volvo, in fact.
But even so, it took me to a check-in zone at Heathrow where, without even getting out of the car, my bag was checked in and my boarding card issued. That was impressive. And then I was escorted by a pretty, slim girl, which is what airline employees should be like, to the Virgin lounge.
My God. It was like walking into the Design Museum. The whole place was dripping with the sort of style that means you can neither open nor close the lavatory doors, and the wine’s Norwegian. It was fabulous.
In the BA lounge you get a cup of coffee and a biscuit and you help yourself. Here, there was a restaurant, bar staff, a smoking area that wasn’t just a glass box like you get at a zoo, a hairdresser’s, several massage parlours, some steam rooms, and a businessman on a mobile phone in a Jacuzzi.
He was unusual. When you fly with BA everyone has a laptop and models themselves on those idiots you see in airport poster advertisements for American banks. But with Virgin most of the passengers looked like the sort of people you might have round for dinner. One was the lighting director for the Eagles. Several were women.
I had a massage, which the girl said was like trying to ease the tension in a fridge door — this is because I’d been unable to get into the lavatory and was in agony — and then I rang the office to find out how much it was all costing. “Oh,” said the girl, “it’s about the same as BA business.”
That’s weird. Normally two similarly priced products designed to do the same sort of thing are roughly the same. A Ford is much the same as a Vauxhall. Evian is pretty much the same as what comes out of your tap. But the gap between Virgin and BA is planetary. And we hadn’t even got on the plane yet.
Superficially, it was the same as BA. They even had a homosexual man to welcome us on board, and scones, and seats that move around electrically. But on Virgin you have a girl in stockings and a suspender belt to give you another massage, and there’s a bar. And I mean a proper bar, on which you can loll.
What’s more, on BA you watch the films when they come on. On Virgin you are the master of your own destiny, thanks to technology that’s bound to break all the time. It certainly did on the way home, but because we were on a 747 the flight took less than nine hours. I therefore didn’t really mind.
So there we are. Finally I’ve found something wrong with British Airways. They’re not good enough. And now it’s time to put a superbug in Beardy’s omelette with a question. If you can make your airline even better than the best airline in the world, how come your trains are such rubbish?
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: UK
Posts: 135
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
"Because the flight was on a 747, I didn't really mind."
Comments like that make me what to knaw my own limbs off. As if to say he would have jumped up and protested if it had been a BA 777 (never mind the fact that it could also have been a BA 744). I do like Clarkson but he does show his ignorance through the use of constant hyperbole and an inability to say anything in plain english; ie, without comparing it to something outlandish or lacing it with his own brand of, usuall failing, humour.
Fair enough article but he is the kind of person who I would happily shoot if I was put in his company. Anyone else?
Comments like that make me what to knaw my own limbs off. As if to say he would have jumped up and protested if it had been a BA 777 (never mind the fact that it could also have been a BA 744). I do like Clarkson but he does show his ignorance through the use of constant hyperbole and an inability to say anything in plain english; ie, without comparing it to something outlandish or lacing it with his own brand of, usuall failing, humour.
Fair enough article but he is the kind of person who I would happily shoot if I was put in his company. Anyone else?
Controversial, moi?
I work for BA and cannot really argue in general with his piece but when he says
I hardly think a difference of 0.01 in mach number warrants the accolade of slothful!
slothful 777
Join Date: Sep 1998
Location: The best in the world... of course!!!
Posts: 67
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Well the man has no problems to express his ideas in terms of words!
I think that his article should be seen as the “customer point of view”.
I was several times on BA lounge, until the day my company sent me to Virgin’s lounge, I was impressed like him.
We have to understand what those passengers (customers) paying very expensive Business or even First Class tickets expect.
It is obvious that one feels really well seating in a restaurant and ordering his meal, and having it freshly cooked, instead eating biscuits and drinking coffee.
Customer dedication brings results and positive ones for sure.
Mercurius
I think that his article should be seen as the “customer point of view”.
I was several times on BA lounge, until the day my company sent me to Virgin’s lounge, I was impressed like him.
We have to understand what those passengers (customers) paying very expensive Business or even First Class tickets expect.
It is obvious that one feels really well seating in a restaurant and ordering his meal, and having it freshly cooked, instead eating biscuits and drinking coffee.
Customer dedication brings results and positive ones for sure.
Mercurius
Guest
Posts: n/a
Wingman
Calm down. Clarkson is a journalist and is bound to get things wrong....................repeatedly.
However, all in all, I thought it was a good article.
Quote: "They even had a homosexual man to welcome us on board" - had me laughing for hours.
A300Man
Calm down. Clarkson is a journalist and is bound to get things wrong....................repeatedly.
However, all in all, I thought it was a good article.
Quote: "They even had a homosexual man to welcome us on board" - had me laughing for hours.
A300Man
....he says what a lot of us think, and gets away with it. He should probably stick to cars, but a lot of what he says/writes about life in general does make me chuckle, in a "Grumpy Old Men" type of way.
His finest hour though was his alleged clobberling of Piers Morgan....
His finest hour though was his alleged clobberling of Piers Morgan....
Join Date: Jun 2001
Location: London
Posts: 52
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
He is right on a few things in that article. Particularly the difference in the standard of IFE between BA and VS. It seems that other Airlines are marching ahead of BA with advances in IFE etc while BA are still stuck with 15 Channels you can't control!!
Prof. Airport Engineer
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Australia (mostly)
Posts: 726
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Clarkson has, unarguably, captured the essence of Virgin upper-class which is why some of us fight so hard to be on it. Dog-legging, backtracking and otherwise adjusting itineraries to suit. I travel it for the funky handkerchiefs, but some probably just go for the girl in stockings and a suspender belt.
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: UK
Posts: 87
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
I actually found it quite an interesting read!
So... mr. A300Man-2005 , when are the EK lounges going to catch up with the VS ones (they're better than those at BA but still VS rules)
Whilst on the topic of lounges, that EK J class lounge at DXB needs to be made BIGGER. Ta.
CP
So... mr. A300Man-2005 , when are the EK lounges going to catch up with the VS ones (they're better than those at BA but still VS rules)
Whilst on the topic of lounges, that EK J class lounge at DXB needs to be made BIGGER. Ta.
CP
Join Date: Jun 2001
Location: uk
Posts: 442
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Apart from the silly J2000 seat thing (which Ridgeway should have been sacked for). Virgin has been ahead of BA (and everyone else) since the early nineties.
Can't understand why it's taken so long for Clarkson to realise this.
Another grate it that i often read in the media that BA invented premium economy. Virgin did this 10 years before BA!
anyway nuff said.
BB
Can't understand why it's taken so long for Clarkson to realise this.
Another grate it that i often read in the media that BA invented premium economy. Virgin did this 10 years before BA!
anyway nuff said.
BB
Guest
Posts: n/a
Crazypilot
I have absolutely no idea when the EK lounges will be on a par with the VS ones. Personally, I don't think they ever will. Virgin is miles ahead when it comes to peripheral services and even the likes of EK will find it hard to catch up!!
By the way, I never fly on EK, so am probably not the best qualified to give an opinion on this particular subject. I fly a lot on VS though. Excellent through and through and Clarkson hits the nail (substantially) on the head when comparing BA with Virgin.
Cheers.
I have absolutely no idea when the EK lounges will be on a par with the VS ones. Personally, I don't think they ever will. Virgin is miles ahead when it comes to peripheral services and even the likes of EK will find it hard to catch up!!
By the way, I never fly on EK, so am probably not the best qualified to give an opinion on this particular subject. I fly a lot on VS though. Excellent through and through and Clarkson hits the nail (substantially) on the head when comparing BA with Virgin.
Cheers.
Join Date: Jul 2004
Location: UK
Posts: 849
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
No surprise to me. It's like anything - when people give unquestioning loyalty to a particular brand and never try the alternatives, you're never going to be in a position to know if you made the best choice.
I buy what I buy because I like it, and I've compared the alternatives. Cost and reward (within reason) doesn't really come into it as long as they are all within the reach of my pocket. It's all about how much enjoyment I get from the product or the service.
Serves the frizzy-haired lanky streak right. Bloody brand snob.
I buy what I buy because I like it, and I've compared the alternatives. Cost and reward (within reason) doesn't really come into it as long as they are all within the reach of my pocket. It's all about how much enjoyment I get from the product or the service.
Serves the frizzy-haired lanky streak right. Bloody brand snob.
Join Date: Aug 2001
Location: Stuck in the middle...
Posts: 1,638
Likes: 0
Received 1 Like
on
1 Post
Well, that's all fine and dandy, Jeremy, for those up the front (pity if you have any interest in anything going on outside the aircraft and want to look out the window... ).
But for those of us paying our own way... Well, Jeremy, just see if you can fit your large frame into a cattle-class VS seat. I'm 6'2" and they're the most uncomfortable Y-cls seats I've ever been trapped in. And the service is patronising and supercilious.
OK, I've only done two return trips with VS cattle, but given they went from bad to worse, I'm not giving them a third try.
I'm not having a go, the drivers were all very professional and my cousin was a F/A - but they were less-than-pleasing experiences. All four sectors.
I suspect that they don't understand that those of us who have to suffer down the back, may then get a choice as to who we put our business bucks on...
But for those of us paying our own way... Well, Jeremy, just see if you can fit your large frame into a cattle-class VS seat. I'm 6'2" and they're the most uncomfortable Y-cls seats I've ever been trapped in. And the service is patronising and supercilious.
OK, I've only done two return trips with VS cattle, but given they went from bad to worse, I'm not giving them a third try.
I'm not having a go, the drivers were all very professional and my cousin was a F/A - but they were less-than-pleasing experiences. All four sectors.
I suspect that they don't understand that those of us who have to suffer down the back, may then get a choice as to who we put our business bucks on...
Join Date: Jan 2004
Location: Isle of Man
Posts: 52
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Had the pleasure of sitting near JC on a flight from IoM - BHX over the summer.
Sadly as BA don't fly there, it was on an Eastern j-41.
Certainly no stockings & suspenders visible, and I'm pretty sure the staff were all confirmed hetero......
He managed to squeeze his frame into a double seat (flight was half empty), but I reckon he would have problems trying to fit one seat!
T'be fair he was very polite and accepted his cup of tea & biccies like the rest of us.....apparently on the return leg it's now a choice of sloe gin or champers!
Distant memories of visiting the flight deck of a VS 340 ex NRT (before they locked all the doors) and having a giggle with the driver about the BA 747 that was desperately trying to get by the 0.81 slug!!
Definitely had the nice lady who rubs you gently in that one.
LOL
Sadly as BA don't fly there, it was on an Eastern j-41.
Certainly no stockings & suspenders visible, and I'm pretty sure the staff were all confirmed hetero......
He managed to squeeze his frame into a double seat (flight was half empty), but I reckon he would have problems trying to fit one seat!
T'be fair he was very polite and accepted his cup of tea & biccies like the rest of us.....apparently on the return leg it's now a choice of sloe gin or champers!
Distant memories of visiting the flight deck of a VS 340 ex NRT (before they locked all the doors) and having a giggle with the driver about the BA 747 that was desperately trying to get by the 0.81 slug!!
Definitely had the nice lady who rubs you gently in that one.
LOL
Join Date: Jul 2002
Location: Ireland
Posts: 596
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
I hardly think a difference of 0.01 in mach number warrants the accolade of slothful!
SoS
Join Date: Sep 2004
Location: UK
Posts: 512
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
quote
-----------------------------------------------------------
He is right on a few things in that article. Particularly the difference in the standard of IFE between BA and VS. It seems that other Airlines are marching ahead of BA with advances in IFE etc while BA are still stuck with 15 Channels you can't control!!
------------------------------------------------------------
Yes, but read on - it didnt actually work on the way back!. Which is my experience of Virgin IFE, about 50/50 if it functions or not.
Upper and Premium both excellent services. Economy isnt.
-----------------------------------------------------------
He is right on a few things in that article. Particularly the difference in the standard of IFE between BA and VS. It seems that other Airlines are marching ahead of BA with advances in IFE etc while BA are still stuck with 15 Channels you can't control!!
------------------------------------------------------------
Yes, but read on - it didnt actually work on the way back!. Which is my experience of Virgin IFE, about 50/50 if it functions or not.
Upper and Premium both excellent services. Economy isnt.
Join Date: Sep 2005
Location: EU
Posts: 39
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Bottom Gear Clarkers
Well he's done it again - some witty journalistic repartee about subjects he doesn't know too much about.....same with cars really.
Extolling the virtues recently of the LandRover sport which does approximately 8 mpg LESS than the original Model T Ford. (12 v 20mpg.) sound like ground-breaking technology to you?
But he is amusing and calls a spade a spade - or in this case a homosexual a homosexual. Any BA Stewards care to comment?
Extolling the virtues recently of the LandRover sport which does approximately 8 mpg LESS than the original Model T Ford. (12 v 20mpg.) sound like ground-breaking technology to you?
But he is amusing and calls a spade a spade - or in this case a homosexual a homosexual. Any BA Stewards care to comment?
Join Date: May 2001
Location: Earth
Posts: 495
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Note to JC: Just as all Motor Journalist/Television presenters are not all lanky, ugly basts with perms, all air stewards are not homosexual!
A Heterosexual one was probably banging the maseuse in the stockings and suspenders, after whom you letch, whilst on the layover.
A Heterosexual one was probably banging the maseuse in the stockings and suspenders, after whom you letch, whilst on the layover.
Last edited by Whiskey Zulu; 4th Oct 2005 at 05:43.