Stelios wants easyJet growth slowdown
20.10.10
easyJet's new Chief Executive Officer, Carolyn McCall, should rein in expansion plans and accept that growth in the budget airline industry has peaked, Bloomberg reports the airline’s founder and biggest shareholder has said. Sir Stelios said she should freeze easyJet’s aircraft fleet at about 200 rather than expand to 315 as planned.
He said in a telephone interview: ‘This is an industry that has matured. Too many planes are employed on routes that only have passengers for 6 months of the year. Do I believe there’s scope to find destinations for 50% more planes? Probably not.’
The airline said last year it would restrict seating increases to 7.5% annually versus an average of 15% between 2005 and 2008. But that is still too high for Sir Stelios, who said easyJet needs to become a year-round operator, ending the ‘unsustainable’ practice of serving routes that are profitable only in the summer and then grounding planes over winter. He said: ‘It’s no longer that same break-neck growth. We’re talking about realistic growth rates of GDP-plus-something.’
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