British Airways creates Concorde marketers

British Airways has created a marketing team solely for Concorde, in a bid to ensure the plane has a smooth return to service later this summer.

The team will be headed by brand manager Wendy Turpin, who already oversees BA’s First Class marketing. Turpin will report to senior manager of long-haul flights Chris Janson.

BA head of communications Kate Gay and representatives from Concorde’s crew and cabin services will work with Turpin.

The airline was unable to give details of the team’s work. A spokeswoman for BA says: “The team was only put together last week so they have not even talked about what form the marketing strategy will take.”

The spokeswoman adds that the department had been set up to co-ordinate Concorde’s return to service, because the company had experienced a lot of interest from the media and Concorde’s frequent flyers.

All seven of BA’s Concorde planes were grounded following Air France’s fatal Concorde crash outside Paris last July, in which 113 people were killed.

The grounding has cost BA more than &£100m, although this does not seem to have affected the airline’s profits, which last week were revealed as &£150m before tax, compared with &£5m last year.