Airport hit by turbulence after carriers fail

THE collapse of holiday airlines Zoom and XL is still weighing on passenger numbers at Glasgow airport, while Edinburgh’s figures climb.

The two carriers folded in 2008 but their vacant slots continued to drag down Glasgow’s performance well into this year.

But the airport said yesterday it was fighting back, with regional carrier FlyBe doubling the number of flights to Jersey to four and extending its services to La Rochelle in France. A spokeswoman for airport operator BAA said airlines including Edinburgh-based Flyglobespan and Canadian Affair were taking up vacant slots and helping to improve Glasgow’s numbers.

Her comments came as figures showed Edinburgh’s passenger numbers last month rose 1.3 per cent to 647,000 month on month, while Glasgow’s fell 4.7 per cent to 489,000.

In the past 12 months, the number of passengers flying from the Scottish capital has increased by 0.7 per cent, but Glasgow’s figure is down 11.4 per cent.

BAA, owned by Spanish group Ferrovial, said its total UK passenger numbers rose by 0.8 per cent to 9.9 million in November – the first monthly increase since March 2008. The group said the rise in passenger numbers was due to improving consumer confidence, adding that London Heathrow’s continued resilience had been highlighted by the fourth monthly increase in the past five months. Traffic at the UK’s largest airport was up 1.1 per cent at five million. Heathrow’s load factor, a measure of how full planes are, rose by 2.6 percentage points, to 70.7 per cent.

BAA chief executive Colin Matthews said: “Global market conditions remain challenging, but these figures are encouraging. There is evidence that consumer confidence is growing and Heathrow’s strong network continues to perform well.”

Gatwick marked its last full month under BAA ownership with a 4.5 per cent increase in passenger numbers to 2.1 million. The site has been bought by the owner of London City Airport – US-based investment fund Global Infrastructure Partners – for just over £1.5 billion.

In March, after a long investigation, the Competition Commission ruled BAA must sell Gatwick and Stansted airports within two years, as well as either Glasgow or Edinburgh.

Group-wide, there was a 4.7 per cent increase in scheduled flights to Europe and a 4.1 per cent rise in long-haul flights. The North Atlantic market was 6.8 per cent down on a year ago, while domestic traffic recorded a 1.7 per cent drop.

As airlines reduce capacity during the tough economic climate in order to cut the number of empty seats, flights from BAA airports fell by 1.4 per cent.

Across the business, the load factor was up 1.8 points at 71.2 per cent.

Cargo activity continued its recent sharp improvement with an increase of 6.2 per cent in what is usually one of the busiest months of the year.

Very.co.uk appoints new brand director

Shop Direct has appointed former Phones4U Direct managing director Gareth Jones as brand director for Very.co.uk.

Jones was at Phones4U Direct for three years. Prior to this he held various store and regional management roles within the company. Jones replaces Alison Broadhurst, who left Shop Direct in October.

Very.co.uk relaunched earlier this year, after being re-branded from Littlewoods Direct. In June, Shop Direct appointed VCCP to work on the brand’s ad account, after a pitch handled by The Observatory.

The refreshed site is aimed at young women and focuses on the fashion, mother and baby, and home and technology categories.

very.co.uk deals

Blyk reaches 200,000 members one year after its launch

Blyk the free mobile network which offers its users free calls and texts in return for receiving adverts and promotions has managed to sign up twice the number of UK users it had originally set out to achieve last year.

The 200’000 members have said to have been achieved through word of mouth with around 6 out of 10 people joining because of a friends recommendation.

Blog author Timo Ahopelto, who is head of strategy at Blyk, said: “Blyk and attending analysts yesterday discussed a major question on the industry’s mind ‘when will mobile advertising take off’?

“In our view, the industry will need to shift its focue from mobile and technology to media solutions that meet brands’ communications goals while creating real value for the consumer.”

Vodafone Sim To Selling Dell Inspiron 9 Netbooks

Vodafone Sim has announced that it will be providing Dell Inspiron Netbooks with its broadband packages.

The netbook will come with a pre installed Vodafone sim along with a built in broadband dongle and will be free with all 2 year mobile braodband contracts with a monthly rental of £25.

The exact date of launch is yet to be announced, but it has been suggested that the it will sometime in mid October.

This is the first bundle is its kind in the UK.

New Snapfish Partnership

Snapfish and Akron book maker Picture me Press have reached an agreement to allow HP customers to customise Picture me books and gifts online using digital photos uploaded onto their snapfish account.

The Snapfish digital books will be very similar to picture me books so a childs face can be added to the book and become the books main character.

Initially 4 books with different themes will be avaliable and another 4 will be releases in the next month.

Littlewoods Clothing promotes autumn collection

Clothing company Littlewoodsdirect.com is launching a £3 million advertising campaign to promote its new Augumn/Winter collection.

A 30 second TV advert has been created called ‘rain dance’ and will showcase the new collection in an ‘entertaining’ way. The advert will be first screened on Monday the 22nd of September during the 8.45pm Coronation street advert break.

Work is also underway for a forthcoming Christmas advert.

Maplin and Edimax join forces

Maplin has launched a new partnership with networking hardware vendor Edimax. The partnership allows Edimax to offer is networking solutions to the high street for the first time.

The 2 products that will be sold by Maplin are – an ADSL modem router and a wireless USB adaptor. The second product is a wireless broadband router and adaptor.

QVC launch mobile ecommerce platform

QVC the traditionally TV based retail company has launched a new mobile ecommerce platform to allow customers to make purchases from their mobile phone.

The launch sees QVC release a new mobile commerce platform as well as text message purchasing functionality, which puts the retailer on par with the giant Amazon.

This news funtion allows users to browse and buy products thought their mobile phone with this new function putting QVC at number 11 in the internet retailers top 500 guide simply because only a small number of retailers have this functionality in place.

Thomas Cook Reassure Customers

With the collapse of the 3 largest UK holiday provider XL last week both Thomas Cook and Tui (Thomsons) have both launched UK wide marketing campaigns to reassure potential customers.

The marketing message shows that both companies are doing their bit to help return stranded holiday makers to the UK, with Thomas Cook reinforcing the companys long, 160 year history and that holidays booked thought them are safe.

Both tour operators have seen share prices rise as a result of this.

Dorothy Perkins and Love Bingo Team UP

The UK bingo site Lovebingo.co.uk has teamed up with arcadia group (which owns – Topman, Dorothy Perkins and Evans) to give new players the chance to win gift vouchers to the value of £178. Players who play through £17 on the bingo site will be automatically entered into the draw.

This is one in a series of ongoing promotions being offered by the St Minver owned bingo site.