Air Malta Should Scrap Its In-Flight Magazine To Cut Costs, Adrian Delia Proposes
Air Malta should scrap its in-flight magazine Il-Bizzilla as a cost-cutting measure, PN MP and former leader Adrian Delia has proposed.
“So Air Malta is going to fire hundreds of workers in a cost-cutting measure. A small cost-cutting idea would be to stop wasting money producing and printing magazines,” Delia said.
He argued that scrapping Il-Bizzilla, which is produced monthly in collaboration with marketing agency TBWA\ANG, will have the added benefit of reducing the spread of COVID-19.
“During the pandemic, restaurants have been forced to remove their paper menus and offer digital alternatives… less money, less virus,” he said.
Last week, Finance Minister Clyde Caruana announced that Air Malta will halve its workforce in an attempt to survive, with hundreds of cargo handlers, cabin crew and administrative officials transferred to other government departments.
Caruana blasted his predecessors for prioritising politics over “common sense” when managing the national airline and admitted that his efforts to appeal for state aid at the European Commission were hindered by credibility issues.
Air Malta’s executive chairperson David Curmi revealed that the airline had only registered an operating profit in two out of 16 years, 2018 and 2019, and this was only the result of non-recurrent events.
In 2018, Air Malta sold its summer landing rights to Heathrow and Gatwick to the government airline Malta MedAir, and in 2019 it sold the Air Malta brand to IP Holding Ltd.
Without these non-recurrent items, the airline would have registered a €17 million loss in 2018 and just broken even in 2019.
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