United Airlines has re-affirmed its commitment to the region as it celebrates 25 years operating a service to and from Manchester Airport.
At an event hosted by Greater Manchester Chamber of Commerce, the airline’s 海角视频 managing director for sales Bob Schumacher said investment into the airline and its fleet “includes upgrading equipment we’re flying to Manchester”.
Mr Schumacher said United Airlines is putting new equipment in its fleet “literally from nose to tail”, including new business class ‘Polaris’ seats.
“We’re seeing that upgrade more and more in Manchester over the course of this year and by the end of this year we’ll see that fleet complete.”
Mr Schumacher said United Airlines was undergoing a period of investment after a “lost decade” in the late 1990s and 2000s.
“What we went through as the US airline industry is a lost decade, where we were just on our knees after 9/11 and Continental slashed the whole workforce by 20 per cent within a week because that was the only way to survive, but we’ve rebuilt...to the point where we have been extremely successful over several years now.”
He said: “We turned over some $42bn worth last year, we made $3bn worth, just under a 10 per cent margin.
“We have a robust business plan and so we’re investing in our product, we’re paying our shareholders and we’re paying down our debt and we’re now running as a healthy company.”
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Mr Schumacher said Manchester continues to be a “key point on our network”.
“It is clearly a point where you who look at potential of opportunity, not only where it sits today but where its opportunity sits and it would take a fool take a fool to say Manchester wasn’t a city going places."
He said: “We don’t do this for fun...we do it because it makes a return and why does it make a return? because we are providing a service in a market that needs it and wants it.
“There’s always an opportunity cost of flying an aircraft on a route here or there, but this one still continues to make sense and that’s because of the support of the business community, the leisure community, and the trade."
However, he said that the airline sells “a disproportionate amount” of seats in the 海角视频 compared to the US.
“Not because they are blind to Manchester, [but] it reminds us all that we have a selling job to do.
“I think it reminds us to continue to position Manchester on the world map and to show its opportunity through industry, through commerce, through cultural incentives, which of course this place has a great reputation for, I don’t know how well that’s known in the US, but we continue to bang that drum.”
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HS2 is “music to our ears”
Mr Schumacher said news that the HS2 project is to go ahead is “music to our ears”.
“Anything that extends the catchment area for [our] hubs is a great thing because it extends the catchment area of our reach and to be able to connect with the rest of the world.
“It’s the right thing if we want business to survive and thrive, which is the raison d’etre for HS2.”
The event also heard from Manchester Airport's chief operating officer Tricia Williams, who said: “North America is really important for us and I would say not just for the north but the 海角视频.
“We’ve got a long history of connections as Bob mentioned... 1.6m people have passed through our doors in Manchester flying to North America and half a million people are flying to New York, but we fly to 10 airports in North America and we are flying the largest network in the 海角视频 outside of London to North America.
She added: “We are very proud of our two runways, we are the only airport outside of London Heathrow with two runways, so it's really important for our growth and the growth of the north that we utilise that asset...and I think it's probably fair to say that we see ourselves as the global gateway to the northern powerhouse.”
Aviation has been the “whipping boy in terms of the environment debate”
When asked how the airline is addressing challenges faced by discussions around climate change, Mr Schumacher said it was important to “change [the] face” of the aviation industry, which he said has been the “whipping boy in terms of the environment debate”.
“Less than three per cent of global CO2 comes from our industry and if you go to what the CEO of Lufthansa has said, and he’s probably right, that at the moment we haven’t found an alternative power source and the only way to get a 550 tonnes up to 35,000ft for 15 hours is through using hydrocarbons.
“At some point that may change, we may be the last users of hydrocarbons, but where we can substitute elsewhere in the supply chain we’ve got to do it.”
He said the airline has a “checklist” of initiatives it's taking to become more environmentally friendly, including investing in biofuel, reducing disposable items on flights, and, until equipment can be replaced, the airline is using scimitar ringlets that sit on the end of a wing “to get more efficiency out of the existing fleet”.
“Every week we’re getting an aeroplane that is...between 20 and 25 per cent more fuel efficent.”
He said: “It’s in our annual report, we burnt 4.1bn gallons of aviation fuel to keep that fleet flying those 1.7m flights so that is the number at the very top, which is huge, and we accept that it’s huge.
“It is in our absolute interest to get that number down in everything that we do, because it’s the second highest expense for the airline after people and the oil prices could go up and very quickly overtake the cost of people.”