BA takes wing in a market that's going places

British Airways (BA) is the largest UK carrier in China and the third-largest European airline, with 33 flights from three cities - Beijing, Shanghai and Hong Kong - to London every week.

It was the first British airline to offer flights between Beijing and London and launched a Shanghai-London route two years ago.

BA recently launched a series of marketing events in China, in a bid to enlarge its share of the Chinese market.

China Daily reporter Zhang Kun spoke to Sara Thorley, manager of BA China, about the airline's strategy in the country.

Q: Who are your customers in China?

A: We have a very mixed customer group in China. There are business and leisure travelers, and students. And we do business through several channels.

First there is the corporate channel, then we work with travel agencies and consolidators, and we have a website where people make reservations directly with us.

We have corporate travelers, golf packages and other tourists. Now we have about 60,000 students traveling from China to London, and the number is growing fast.

The travel agencies in China's big cities share similar ways of doing business, and travelers from major Chinese cities such as Chongqing and Chengdu have similar traveling behavior to those from Beijing or Shanghai.

Q: What's British Airways' latest move in China?

A: We have moved to the new terminal in London's Heathrow Airport, and we have just launched the Speedbird Club website in Chinese, to enhance communications with China's travel trade.

The Speedbird Club is an interactive portal, and an initiative of British Airways for the past five years. It comes in different languages, and the latest is in Mandarin.

Now we work with about 400 to 600 agents in China, and we are aiming to reach all of them in this new way.

We have started face-to-face training on the use of the site and roadshow promotions.

Q: How's your business growth in China?

A: We've had very good growth in the two years in Shanghai. I can't disclose detailed statistics, but we have double-digit growth.

People going out of China from Shanghai make a smaller proportion. Most of our passengers are visitors to Shanghai.

The number of leisure travelers is growing year by year. China's middle class is growing. More money is spent on traveling. China has a new evolving market and a booming tourism industry, with lots of things happening.

Q: Is there a glass ceiling for women in the industry? Have you encountered difficulties as a woman working in a leadership position in China?

A: British Airways has been proactive on women's right to work in advanced positions. It's one of the first to allow women to be pilots. Now about 30 percent of British Airways' pilots are women. An interesting fact is that, among our four airport and cargo managers in Beijing and Shanghai, only one is male. It's easy to work as a woman in China.

Q: Can Chinese join your crew? Do you recruit crew members in China?

A: We do recruit Chinese cabin crew. We need to have at least one Mandarin speaker on the flight from China. But at the moment we don't have a recruiting base in China. We have an Asian recruiting base in Singapore.

(China Daily 09/11/2007 page15)