Issues & Trends – March 2011
Rapidly growing Strategic Airlines plans re-branding for later this year
STRATEGIC Airlines will change its name later this year – probably around August, observers believe.
In an interview with travelBulletin, which appears in full on pages 14 and 15 of the March issue, Strategic Group founder and executive director Michael James outlined the reasoning behind the move.
“Strategic is a well established charter business name and we will retain it as one of our brands,” said James.
“However for our growing scheduled passenger airline we believe we need a name and identity that better reflects a number of the key differentiators and brand values of our commercial airline and our future direction.”
James, whose parents were travel agents, also said that travel agents and tour wholesalers have a “critical” role to play in distribution of his rapidly growing airline’s product.
He revealed: “We have very recently contracted Mercator Ltd, the IT solutions provider of the Emirates Group to provide our future reservations and customer service systems IT platform.
“Mercator Asia will develop, host and support Strategic Airline’s new system with key elements including reservations, GDS connectivity, internet booking, internet check-in, departure control, and frequent flyer capabilities.
“The system will deliver Strategic immediate benefits bringing full GDS and interline connect-ivity, an integrated IATA e-ticket database and direct distribution with a wide range of further capabilities to serve the needs of our industry partners.”