flyingcrazy

I remember a few years back AMS did an advertising campaign on the London Underground calling itself 'London's third airport' trying to entice more London based travellers to change planes there instead of using Heathrow. I also remember KLM had a similar advertising campaign calling itself the 'UK's favourite airline' and 'Britain's national carrier'.

But did the AMS management ever go further and actually consider changing there name to London Amsterdam? Then they could have competed further with London Heathrow and London Gatwick. With there massively pro British outlook I would think such an idea plausible.

irishguy28

Amsterdam markets itself as a hub for all of the UK - and not just the South-East:



Schiphol would not be able to call itself a "London" airport. It clearly isn't a London airport. And one would wonder at the sanity of trying to pass it off as such, unless as a tongue-in-cheek one-off publicity gimmick. An serious attempt to do so would make themselves look ridiculous, and would not play well with any of their passengers. Not to say the potential confusion it would cause (think of those stories about people arriving in Sydney, Canada, expecting they were going to be arriving in Sydney, Australia [1, 2, 3, etc..] , and expect it to occur a couple of times a week, if not more frequently!).

People from the rest of the UK can connect, if they want, in a London (Proper) airport already, if they want to. Calling an airport in a foreign country "London" is not likely to make any more transfer there, and it certainly isn't going to make travellers from London fly from one London airport to another! And no matter how ridiculous such a scheme would look in the UK, it would play even worse in the Netherlands, and everywhere else.

Amsterdam has more direct links from UK cities than any single London airport. For many in the UK, it's a more important connection point already. Why would they want to jeopardise that by doing something so dunderheaded? They appeal to the entire UK as it is. Trying to pretend they are something they clearly aren't would just be so bad...

The UK is an important market for the Schiphol, but calling the airport "London" would not help - in fact, it would probably harm them. If it was even possible!

flyingcrazy

Hahahaha thats all true. However with KLM and AMS constant cheesy UK advertising I thought maybe they should practice what they preach.

irishguy28

If by "practicing what they preach" you mean serving the entire UK better than any of the existing London airports, then they already do so - and in a way that doesn't alienate any other markets, attract negative attention or make them look ridiculous!

flyingcrazy

I mean by becoming part of the UK.

It cannot be 'Britain's hub airport' without being on British soil. It cannot be 'London third airport' without being in or about London. It cannot operate 'Heathrow's third runway' without actually being part of Heathrow.

KLM cannot be 'Britains flag carrier' without becoming a UK registered company, relocating its HQ to the UK and managing to beat BA and VS to the title.

All these cheesy slogans they have to woo the UK market actually make me more likely not to use AMS/KL cause they irritate me.

A bit like Calais now calling itself the 'UK's port' that annoys me aswell. The Mayor of Calais said after London 2012 beat Paris 2012 that Calais was 'part of southern England not Northern France', last time I checked Calais was not annexed to the UK.

It seems our neighbours are desperate to become part of us.

irishguy28

You're free to take your business elsewhere if their slogans annoy you that much!

And ABZ is far more likely to leave the UK than AMS is to join the UK! I was under the impression that the fashion was for ever-further devolution.

AMS will take British passengers regardless, as they always have.

flyingcrazy

They do annoy me!!! I usually choose my airlines on the hub I will have to transfer through however not slogans! AMS is actually my second favourite transfer option however I always view it as DUTCH.

ABZ may leave the UK, it may not. However AMS claiming to be British on a semi regular basis is rather annoying.

Of course British passengers will still use AMS just like Dutch passengers use LHR but you never here LHR claiming to be 'The Netherlands Hub' do you?

irishguy28

I doubt LHR has had to advertise its services for many, many years. It's full to capacity and has more demand than it can handle.

The Netherlands is a small market for LHR - only 2 airlines fly from there to the Netherlands, serving 2 Dutch airports. The UK, however, is the most important foreign market for AMS. 6 airlines currently serve 25* UK airports (8 airlines if you want to count CityFlyer and Cityhopper separately from their parents). A 26th airport, Cambridge, starts next week.

*As best as I can tell, each of these 25 UK airports currently has direct service to AMS: Aberdeen, Belfast, Birmingham, Bristol, Cardiff, Durham Tees Valley, Edinburgh, Exeter, Glasgow, Humberside, Inverness, Leeds Bradford, Liverpool, London City, London Gatwick, London Heathrow, London Luton, London Southend, London Stansted, Manchester, Manston, Newcastle, Norwich, Nottingham East Midlands, Southampton.

Henry III

Very interesting news, irishguy28! It's got me thinking ... what chance for KL codeshares on F7 (Darwin) metal, AMS-CBG? It would make for some interesting work trips for me: with the EDI-LCY Cityjet service being scrapped, I could certainly get some interesting segment runs, GLA-AMS-CBG.

Or are KL set on opening up routes to more mainstream UK airports, like Manston?

-- Henry

flyertalker00143

well, it's called Marketing



sure, you should ask the Queen to annex Amsterdam to the United Kingdom too

flyingcrazy

Why not?

flyingcrazy

Although this is correct LHR still handles more UK passengers than AMS. Most British travellers in regional areas of the UK still use LHR more than they use AMS. The ABZ-LHR route has twice as many pax as the ABZ-AMS route and the situation is similar with NCL-LHR, MAN-LHR, EDI-LHR, and GLA-LHR. I cannot comment on LBA-LHR.

Also many Dutch travellers use LHR as a changeover for services to North America as in many cases it is cheaper than AMS direct.

Whilst I understand the UK is important to AMS, both CDG and FRA benefit from UK transfer passengers but I never hear them boasting about being British.

irishguy28

Yes, of course LHR handles more UK-originating passengers than AMS does - LHR handles transfer passengers originating in other domestic airports, while also handling O&D traffic originating not just in the South-East, but in all of the UK.

I really think you have completely misinterpreted Amsterdam Airport Schiphol's marketing shpiel - they are neither boasting, nor claiming to be British.

But I doubt you will find any other airport anywhere in the world - even within Britain - that has direct connections to as many British airports.

flyingcrazy

But AMS saying it is the UK's hub airport is completely incorrect because LHR is the UK's hub airport.

Sure AMS has direct flights to a lot of UK airports but these include airports that are too close to LHR to warrant a direct flight (LTN, STN, LGW, LCY, CMB, BRS, BHX).

Maybe I have misunderstood, this was never supposed to be a 100% serious post and I never have expected AMS to rename itself. Its just their rather cheesy marketing campaigns are a bit naff IMO.

irishguy28

I have never seen anything that actually emanated from Schiphol themselves that stated that AMS was, and I quote, "the UK's hub airport". (Here is Boris Johnson saying that AMS is the UK's hub airport, but that's entirely a different thing than accusing AMS themselves of saying that!).

Is it possible you have just taken the tenor of their advertising (such as the one I linked to above) and taken it several steps further? Or just misattributed this nationalistic quote?

I've also found Colin Matthews, "head of Heathrow", quoted in the Telegraph as saying:

So it seems that it is BoJo and Heathrow that are beefing up their case for change by scaremongering about the pre-eminence/threat of Schiphol. They're banging a nationalistic drum indeed, which is what seems to have got your goat up! But it's your countrymen that have done so, not Schiphol.

An older article in the Evening Standard quotes the Schiphol Group president as saying "We are proud to be the UK’s preferred non-British airport" and while it refers to an allegation - NOT A PUBLIC DECLARATION - that Schiphol "cheekily nicknamed one of the six runways at the Amsterdam airport “Heathrow’s third runway”". (That could be the Polderbaan - it is far enough away from the airport that it feels as if you have taxied all the way from London). Boris Johnson, yet again, is quoted as saying "Increasingly Schiphol can afford to promote itself as a British hub airport serving Europe precisely because we are dithering in the long grass here at home". But it is only British people themselves that call AMS a "British Hub", and it is fairly plain to see why they do so.

References to the Polderbaan's distance from the airport are often less than complimentary, so this idea about Amsterdam having Heathrow's third runway is largely intended as a joke, anyway...I really don't think you can take any reference to Amsterdam having, or claiming to have, Heathrow's third airport seriously. Though some people will of course latch on to that as another rod to beat the UK government with, however ridiculous that actually is!

The following are all from the BA thread "Funniest Onboard Announcements"