As I poured Al Ain camel's milk over my Weetabix, it occurred to me that Salut! is just the sort of enterprise of which Sir Richard Branson might have approved had the internet existed when we were both budding entrepreneurs, he running his magazine Student, me trying to flog bumper bundles of old matchday programmes through ads in Charlie Buchan's Football Monthly.
But our careers were to take different paths. The paths may have criss-crossed on occasion, but we have tended for the most part to keep ourselves to ourselves.
These days indeed, I cannot even get him to force his people to answer a searching question or two about the small matter of legroom on long-haul Virgin Atlantic flights.
In case anyone otherwise misses it, I draw attention to this reply, posted last night to the original article that I headlined Virgin knees up: "Ha! Those are my legs. 12 hours from London to Tokyo in that. I've not flown with them since..."
Thanks to Moaksey's belated spotting of the unexpected exposure his legs enjoyed at Salut!, I can now remind the Virgin press office of this exchange of e-mails:
From me (Dec 4 2007)
Katie
I recently had an uncomfortable experience of flying Virgin Atlantic – Heathrow to Delhi – and have written about it at my site Salut! (at http://www.francesalut.com/2007/12/india-2-1.html ). There is an invitation to Sir Richard in the article to respond and while this is a genuine offer, I do realise that he is likely to be rather too busy to accept. But you ought to know that I will happily post a response from a member of the press office team should you feel there are points to be made to counter my criticisms.
From them (Dec 10 2007)
Hi Colin,
I have passed your email onto Paul Charles. He is currently out of the country but will come back to you shortly
Kind Regards
Katie Francis
PA to Director of Communications and Press Office Assistant
Virgin may have a complete answer to the criticisms levelled by Moaksey and me. But unless its press office has an unconventional defintion of the word "shortly", this may be an answer we are destined never to see.
Perhaps I am being impatient. Other press offices take an even more relaxed approach to keeping to their word. I am, after all, still waiting for a fax faithfully promised by the French foreign ministry in Sept 2004. But if anyone should bump into Sir Richard - or Paul, or Katie - a gentle reminder would not be out of order.
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