Yald Patrick Grote's Blog

Flying first class with Virgin Atlantic … service is profitable

Virgin Atlantic is an airline started by Richard Branson and offers flights between the United States and United Kingdom as well as other routes. They have made a niche in the airline industry by focusing on service and comfort.

The New York Times featured an article this weekend on the way Virgin Atlantic is exploiting a niche in service:

Virgin Atlantic's $4.5 million campaign focuses on the carrier's 16 daily flights out of its nine gateways in the United States. Each flight has been given a name that evokes the romance and elegance of travel in years past and is described on new Web sites - one for each flight - and in ads in regional editions of national magazines.

This is fantastic. They have named each of their flights and created a sense of wonder.

The Virgin Atlantic flights are named:

• The Refresh Air
• The Higher Flier
• The Trance Atlantic
• The Lo Pro
• The Suite Dream
• The London Shuttle
• The Recline-Air
• The Wide Eye
• The Fly Chi
• The Diplomat
• The Rising Star
• The Sky Den
• The Networker
• The Air Lair
• The 050 Winks

You can go to each of the Virgin Atlantic flights and watch a flash movie that demonstrates the meaning behind the flight. You can almost feel the comfort, service and excitement of flying again.

This focus has payed off for Virgin Atlantic as they have made as much money as ever:

Virgin reported pre-tax profits of £68 million in a year when it was forced to slap a fuel surcharge on air fares after oil prices hit new highs.

But the carrier headed off any criticism that the surcharge was a tool to boost profits, saying it only recovered one-third of the additional costs it faced during the year.

They increased the amount of passengers they carried from 3.4 million to 4.4 million.

The service and comfort sounds wonderful, right?

The price tag for flying first class on Virgin Atlantic is pretty reasonable. Reasonable if you compare it to owning your own private jet.

To fly from Orlando to London first class will set you back about $9800.

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