VTEC to drop branding

[fusionblue]

Only the Manchester slots belonged to VS (some of which are used to go to Atlanta now), the Aberdeen/Edinburgh ones will return to BA.

 

[Stats]

**Off-topic**

As I see it, Virgin Atlantic never had any intention or desire to run those routes - it was all about the Heathrow slots. They had to continue using them for domestic routes for (as I recall) two years after acquiring them from BMI. Now they're free to use them for other purposes.

No they're not. Virgin Atlantic returned the slots. 7 of the 9 slots must still be used for Heathrow to Edinburgh/Aberdeen for summer 2016 and bids for the slots had to be submitted last month. A further 5 or 6 slots can only be used for flights to Nice, Cairo, Moscow, Riyadh, Edinburgh or Aberdeen.

 

[najaB]

No they're not.

Thanks for the correction. I must confess that I've not followed the details, I just knew that scuttlebut when they started up Little Red was that Virgin weren't committed to the routes long-term and it was about getting additional slots for their long-haul operation.

 

[Starmill]

This brand is toxic: everyone believes in it because they've been successfully tricked by it.

Anyone who actually uses these services knows exactly what bluff and bluster the Red Tide is.

The TV advert itself makes me feel sick. What's the message?

"Hey! Are you a self-confident white, middle-class heterosexual male? Great! Give us loads of you money to travel "Virgin Trains" and you will have a better love life!"

 

[DarloRich]

Came over the internal messaging system earlier,

VTEC to drop their current branding and re-brand simply as Virgin Trains. Customer feedback suggests that they see west coast and east coast as one brand, and having the east coast bit merely complicates matters.

Thought they learnt this lesson from back in XC days.....

didn't take long!

 

[Bletchleyite]

This brand is toxic: everyone believes in it because they've been successfully tricked by it.

I won't deny they are very clever with their marketing to get customers on side, but that is false for most people.

Anyone who actually uses these services knows exactly what bluff and bluster the Red Tide is.

I find the service on Virgin West Coast to be entirely acceptable, personally. It is much better than the service on the WCML in BR days. I have not had cause for a significant complaint against VWC for a very long time, they just seem to be getting on with the job quietly and competently.

The TV advert itself makes me feel sick. What's the message?

"Hey! Are you a self-confident white, middle-class heterosexual male? Great! Give us loads of you money to travel "Virgin Trains" and you will have a better love life!"

Who cares? If you don't like television advertising, watch more BBC. You'll probably find the programming of a higher quality as well.

 

[JaJaWa]

Incredibly, both companies have rebranded to Virgin Trains. But you won't get the best offers for all of these Virgin Trains on http://www.virgintrains.co.uk, as despite not saying anywhere, this website is still just for the West Coast. You have to know to book your ticket on http://www.virgintrainseastcoast.com, despite what https://www.virgintrains.co.uk/eastcoast will tell you (As always, virgintrains.co.uk is the best place to book your tickets).

The former-Virgin Trains part of "Virgin Trains" also still refuse to add the text "West Coast" to their Facebook or Twitter, and still complain when passengers write complaints about their former-East Coast services on there. Incredible.

 

[IanXC]

Came over the internal messaging system earlier,

VTEC to drop their current branding and re-brand simply as Virgin Trains. Customer feedback suggests that they see west coast and east coast as one brand, and having the east coast bit merely complicates matters.

Thought they learnt this lesson from back in XC days.....

Hmm. Why does 'be careful what you wish for' come to mind?! I hardly see how this change is really going to reduce complication, all we're going to do is loose what remaining transparency we had.

 

[thenorthern]

With Virgin Trains pre-2007 the Cross Country services were sometimes branded on information boards as "Virgin Cross Country" although at many stations such as Stoke-on-Trent most people didn't know the difference between the two.

I will be interested to see what the new route map will look like although to a certain extent I think this is a good decision.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Might this have contributed to the decision to withdraw the Railcard concession on West Coast, I wonder?

 

[JaJaWa]

Might this have contributed to the decision to withdraw the Railcard concession on West Coast, I wonder?

Yeah in their justifying statements possibly!

 

[Observer]

Oh I hope this leads to phasing out the god-awful livery on the EC.

What's wrong with the coke can livery?

 

[LNW-GW Joint]

The other argument for not merging the brands is that West Coast is due for rebidding in 2016, so the joint branding may be short-lived.
That and trying to split the joint costs between two franchises with different contracts and franchise commitments (as demanded by DfT).
The original Virgin Trains (WC + XC) was a genuine single operation for 7 years or so until DfT decided to rebid XC.
That's not possible today, with DfT enforcing the contractual split.

 

[Retorus]

What's wrong with the coke can livery?

I like it on the HSTs but it's not very flattering on the 91s.

 

[thenorthern]

Might this have contributed to the decision to withdraw the Railcard concession on West Coast, I wonder?

Unlikely, I think Virgin Trains (West Coast) had plans to ditch it in 2012 if they won the franchise but kept it in case the DfT complained.

Strange question but when it was Virgin Cross Country and West Coast both used the VT code but of course now VT is Virgin West Coast and GR (after GNER) is Virgin Trains East Coast. Will they now both use VT as their code?

 

[JaJaWa]

Unlikely, I think Virgin Trains (West Coast) had plans to ditch it in 2012 if they won the franchise but kept it in case the DfT complained.

Wasn't it only introduced around the time they lost to First anyway?

 

[NSEFAN]

I like it on the HSTs but it's not very flattering on the 91s.

I've found it makes photography of the ECML expresses a bit easier, if nothing else!

 

[LNW-GW Joint]

Wasn't it only introduced around the time they lost to First anyway?

No, it's been going since at least 2002, probably earlier.
It was introduced when passenger numbers were depressed because of the never-ending WCRM project.

 

[button_boxer]

I'm sure there is a significant number of occasional travellers who think XC services are still run by Virgin today...

 

[najaB]

Strange question but when it was Virgin Cross Country and West Coast both used the VT code but of course now VT is Virgin West Coast and GR (after GNER) is Virgin Trains East Coast. Will they now both use VT as their code?

I don't see that they can - although they will both be using Virgin Trains as their brand, they are still separate TOCs.

 

[pdeaves]

I'm sure there is a significant number of occasional travellers who think XC services are still run by Virgin today...

Oh, there is (and not just 'occasional' travellers, either).

 

[dosxuk]

How does this tie in with all the posters who were claiming that the franchise has to be branded as <operator> East Coast? Weren't we told that the DfT was now stipulating the names of the franchises and the base livery in order to stop all the money being wasted on rebranding exercises?

 

[SaveECRewards]

JaJaWa sums up my thoughts on the confusion this will bring quite well. If you want to be sure to earn Nectar points on a Virgin branded train you need to book on a FirstGroup website due to the odd situation that First gives points on all rail travel and VTEC/VT only give points on their own services.

I like the ad itself and even the principle that the two Virgin operators should cooperate in advertising. However they need to distinguish the two operators at the point of contact so people don't get passed between the two operators when they contact the wrong one. It's reasonable to assume to the average passenger that virgintrains.co.uk is the point of contact for all Virgin trains.

 

[Tempest3K]

Noticed on my way north today that all the announcements onboard were missing the east coast on the end, presumably as part of this?

 

[JaJaWa]

Noticed on my way north today that all the announcements onboard were missing the east coast on the end, presumably as part of this?

Hopefully they can now say "Welcome aboard this Virgin Train to ___" like they do on West Coast, they often stumbled over "Welcome aboard this Virgin Trains East Coast service to ___"..!

How does this tie in with all the posters who were claiming that the franchise has to be branded as <operator> East Coast? Weren't we told that the DfT was now stipulating the names of the franchises and the base livery in order to stop all the money being wasted on rebranding exercises?

Think that's the policy that DfT would like, but isn't currently enforcing. Roger Ford says that the DfT wanted Virgin Trains East Coast to be branded as LNER.

 

[dk1]

Noticed on my way north today that all the announcements onboard were missing the east coast on the end, presumably as part of this?

Thankgoodness for that. Sounded so awkward from day 1.

 

[IanXC]

How does this tie in with all the posters who were claiming that the franchise has to be branded as <operator> East Coast? Weren't we told that the DfT was now stipulating the names of the franchises and the base livery in order to stop all the money being wasted on rebranding exercises?

I seem to recall something along the lines that the franchise must have a base identity, and that if a franchisee wanted to brand to something else. Both doing so, and returning the franchise to its base identity at the end of the co tract would be at its own cost.

 

[Starmill]

I find the service on Virgin West Coast to be entirely acceptable, personally. It is much better than the service on the WCML in BR days. I have not had cause for a significant complaint against VWC for a very long time, they just seem to be getting on with the job quietly and competently.

That's my point. They do a decent job. They have good points and poorer points. Overall, they aren't bad. They do the same fairly good job I personally think almost anyone would do in their position (new trains and billions of pounds of taxpayers money spent on their infrastructure). They aren't outstanding. They aren't significantly better than everyone else would be if they were doing that job. That is what their branding has tricked people into believing. Just look how many people signed the petition to keep them in 2012.

Who cares? If you don't like television advertising, watch more BBC. You'll probably find the programming of a higher quality as well.

I hardly watch TV at all. It autoplayed on social media!

As to the rest of the discussion, my usual (tentative) position is that railways are a Natural Monopoly. This means that they experience economies of scale that are so high that only 1 firm can efficiently provide the market. I would suggest that if funding for infrastructure and operations are all going to be coming from the incomes of the firm(s) selling the industry's output then a link between them needs to be preserved. The answer to natural monopolies is regulation which is supposed to simulate the effects of competition. Franchising is one way of doing that. I'm quite convinced that there are better ways of implementing it than currently. In summary on-rail competition is a self-defeating waste of time as far as achieving the things people usually want to achieve when they desire competition (i.e. not just for the sake of it); higher output, lower prices and better quality.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Just look how many people signed the petition to keep them in 2012.

I supported this, because I don't want the execrable FirstGroup anywhere near any public transport service of any kind that I have to use with any frequency.

Had the alternative been full Stagecoach ownership, I would have been happy for the franchise change to proceed.

As to the rest of the discussion, my usual (tentative) position is that railways are a Natural Monopoly. This means that they experience economies of scale that are so high that only 1 firm can efficiently provide the market. I would suggest that if funding for infrastructure and operations are all going to be coming from the incomes of the firm(s) selling the industry's output then a link between them needs to be preserved. The answer to natural monopolies is regulation which is supposed to simulate the effects of competition. Franchising is one way of doing that. I'm quite convinced that there are better ways of implementing it than currently. In summary on-rail competition is a self-defeating waste of time as far as achieving the things people usually want to achieve when they desire competition (i.e. not just for the sake of it); higher output, lower prices and better quality.

Agreed.

 

[anme]

I don't agree at all. The brand is still well respected outside the railway enthusiast community.

I've rarely used their train service, so can't really comment on that. I was referring to the music shops (closed), cola (abandoned?), airline (actually not that bad, but several routes recently abandoned and in some financial difficulties I believe), cable TV service, "space" flights, etc.