Virgin Atlantic recently celebrated the 40th anniversary of its first flight. Since its founding, it has endured more than its fair share of growing pains, financial challenges, and underhanded tactics from its biggest rivals. Today, it is one of the United Kingdom’s flag carriers with an instantly recognizable livery and is renowned for its innovative approach.
But how did Virgin Atlantic come to be? A missed flight and a bright idea According to Sir Richard Branson , its founder, it all started when a flight that he was booked on was canceled last minute. Branson famously chartered an aircraft and sold tickets to all the passengers who had been bumped. And he says it got him thinking .
“This led to a big ‘what if...
’ moment. I traveled a lot, watching and signing bands and doing deals (for Virgin Records). Traveling by plane wasn’t fun.
It was awful. Tickets were expensive, service was terrible, the food was worse, and there was no competition to push the airlines to do anything about it. I realized there was a gap in the market.
What if we did something different and gave passengers a great experience.” The opportunity to “do something different” would come along much sooner than expected. A gap in the market Laker Airways pioneered low-cost flights across the Atlantic with its McDonnell Douglas DC-10 Skytrains in the late 1970s.
But by 1982, it had collapsed under the weight of over $300 million in debt. The airline's former chief pilot, Capt. Alan Hellary.