Stelios calls for easyJet to slow growth
20.10.10
easyJet's new Chief Executive Officer, Carolyn McCall, must rein in expansion and accept that growth in the budget airline industry has peaked, Bloomberg reports the carrier’s founder and biggest shareholder has said. Sir Stelios said she should freeze easyJet’s aircraft fleet at about 200 rather than the planned 315.
He said in a telephone interview: ‘This is an industry that has matured. Too many aircraft are employed on routes that only have passengers for six months of the year. Do I believe there’s scope to find destinations for 50 percent more planes? Probably not.’
The airline said last year it would restrict seating increases to 7.5 percent annually versus an average of 15 percent 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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