Airlines in a Crisis

In Norway we have several examples on this. Norwegian was/is hq'd at Fornebyu that haven't been an airport for over 20 years. Flyr was hq'd in the overexpensive Oslo city center. And Norse hq'd in Arendal, a town without an airport and even further from Oslo airport than Oslo itself. The train connections from hq to airport might be frequent and only take halve to an hour but its not the same as a 10 minute walk to oversee where your real operations happens. The place where your customers experience your service and most of your critical costs are spent. But also the costs most easily squeezable. Closenes let you reduce the costs before they occur rather than just financially overseeing the bills in accounts after they have happened. That makes a difference when it comes to reducing costs through strict control.  And low costs are the most important for being able to underprise your competitors. Something all the beforementioned airlines tried and tries because they see

Virgin Atlantic got going with it already in March 2020 managing 4000 cargo only flights in the year.. And with the panemic continuing into 2021 they are regularising the service offering 33 flights per week. Why haven't Norwegian managed do even 1, instead parking the whole fleet of 787 's resulting in its complete demise. Did they fall foul of internal resources with an all is difficult attitude. That didn't see how the new cargo market differentiated from that of previous.  Why haven't SAS managed to take advantage of the booming cargo only flight market due to the lack of passenger flights to send cargo with. They do have a sizeable cargo division with a precense in many locations and all the wide body containerised capcity that was needed. Even planes that was being retired/scrapped where seats could have been stripped for extra capacity and nobody would care about some extra cosmetic damage. All they lacked was vision, fantasy and a can-do mentality. Both airlines

Most startups place their HQ at or near their main airport to keep a close eye on operations. It can also give combined advantages. Sample the DUB based flight crews used to meet up at the Ryanair hq and transport in a van directly to the planes, needing no extra office space within the terminal. Ryanair management used to walk or drive up to the airport complex frequently and many of their top management where known to be very hands on. Sample during the baggage handler strike of 98 they where all handling suitcases. In fact every male employee in the White House (nick name for then Ryanair HQ) was. And most of hq staff had airport airside passes hither and tither. Even after the move to larger premises the DUB airport main terminal is less than a 5 minute drive away. Airlines like Norwegian on the other hand seem to have missed that the Oslo airport have moved from Fornebu to Gardermoen at the opposit end of the city. Not only that but they are paying rent at what is rumoured to g

The one part of Norwegian's top leaders that seems to be doing ok even in Corona times is Finance represented by Geir Karlsen. But then he was the CEO for a few months. On the other hand this concurrent story of delayed aand abandoned presentations of the current staate of affairs is wearing a litle on the mantle gained during the financial restructuring of the airline. Operations is not doing well in neither running an airline consiting of a fleet of 7 planes. Nor can they organize the and neither do they have a plan for how to expand and test the waters for other possiblilities. With that we can put a minus on the PR and press handling department because the way they have defended this shambles reminds us of the days of Comical Ali. Engineering also seems pretty distant if they think having only 7 planes in action instead of rotating the whole fleet to keep it current and avoid massive maintenance costs at the end. And what about that other Dreamliner fleet where nothing is m

The company have been busy reorganizing it's finance side with converting parts of loans and leases to shares to save the company, selling out the existing shareholders in the process. What have been missing is some operational management and ideas. One would think that with only 7 out of 160 planes in the air they would be on top of things, but no. Daily we read new articles about why they can't keep to in Norway mandated social distancing with middle seat free, and ecuses why. Do not say much for either management nor their IT systems or their control on the aircrafts. Since the newish CEO came in we have been waiting for when his operational plan for how Norwegian should be run would be announced. One certainly can't say he hit the ground running in that department. So far everything new is financial and under the former tempe CEO's remit Norwegian could doo so much more out of this crisis. They have 787's that can take air-containerized freight, but have sho