Better loads and more flights cut Ansett loss

Press, 1 August 1989, Page 6

Better loads and more flights cut Ansett loss

By

LES BLOXHAM

Better loads and more flights have I enabled Ansett New Zealand to cut its losses during the last 12 months. : As was widely reported at the time, ! the airline lost more than $2 million a month during its first year — too much ’ for Brierley Investments, one of the i partners of the original consortium, who pulled out after losing $l4 million in the < first seven months. < During the last year the airline is 1 believed to have cut its losses by more s than three-quarters to about $6 million — down to a monthly average of about 1 $500,000 — and boosted its loads 23 per 5 cent t It expects to further reduce losses with ] the introduction this week of new services and more flights. s The company’s public relations mana- 1 ger, Mr Brian Lockstone, yesterday clari- 2

ned newspapers reports that the airline had lost $3O million “last year.” It had in fact lost $3O million in the financial year ending June 30, 1988, he said. The airline was confident that its new whisper jets would “bring a further resurgence of fortunes.” “There has already been a tremendous interest in our first new jet which carried close to 500 passengers on its first day of commercial service,” he said. The airline’s chief executive, Mr John Buchanan, said in Queenstown at the week-end that the company knew it would not make a profit in its early years. The second of its seven whisper jets is scheduled to arrive at Christchurch on Thursday. It will enter service on August 20.