BA is already under intense pressure over the strikes that have grounded hundreds of flights and left thousands of BA passengers stranded at Heathrow.
But now Virgin is attacking it on another front. Created by Virgin Atlantic's ad agency, Rainey Kelly Campbell Roalfe/Y&R, the poster shows newspaper cuttings reporting Concorde's imminent demise, under the tagline 'BA's talking scrap'.
It goes up later this week and marks an escalation in the war of words over Concorde's retirement following attempts by Sir Richard Branson to acquire the fleet from BA. Those efforts have foundered because of the prohibitive cost of maintaining the fleet.
In an attempt to minimise the PR fallout, BA has pledged to set up a charitable trust through which Concorde will be used to generate money for good causes. The carrier is also running a promotional campaign to offer seats on-board Concorde's final commercial flights.
Despite the discomfort for BA over the introduction of a staff swipecard clocking-in system, which prompted the walkout earlier this month, Virgin Atlantic said it had no plans to exploit the issue in an ad campaign.
"BA is getting enough bad publicity as it is," said a spokeswoman. "We don't see the need to pay to give them any more."
Last weekend, Ryanair ran a press ad mocking BA's supposed status as a high-quality airline which served its customers' needs. As Marketing recently revealed (July 24), BA has been forced to shelve a three-week TV campaign, ironically showing images of cancelled flights and airport queues, because of the strikes.
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