Blue Islands "is not for sale"

Thursday 19 September 2019

Despite rumours circulating online, Blue Islands has said there are no plans for the business to be sold.

This comes amid increasing difficulties in local air travel markets, with Blue Islands' States-owned competition, Aurigny, preparing to post record losses.

It was rumoured that Blue Islands had been approaching other airlines in the Channel Islands to ask if they wanted to buy the business, but Tim Coates, speaking on behalf of his father, Derek, has stamped on this idea. 

Pictured: The rumour has been seen in a number of places online, one of which was PPrune, a pilot's forum. 

"On behalf of my father, I can assure our Blue Islands customers that it is business as usual as we continue to invest in the next exciting phase of the airline’s expansion, and a sustained promise for customer service to be at the core of our business values," he said.

"As stated previously, there are currently no plans to sell the business. We are committed to the continued success of Blue Islands and our investment in realising our growth aspirations, together with those of our franchise partner.

“Blue Islands has its roots in the islands and is committed to high-frequency, year-round, sustainable travel which we believe is essential to the wellbeing and livelihood of our islands.”

Recently, Blue Islands actually expanded its business in Guernsey.  It used to lease the service from Aurigny, but now employs a number of people at the airport. The airline has also been taking advantage of the quasi-Open Skies policy Guernsey introduced to run a number of routes to places in the UK. 

On the other hand though, last year Express was able to report that one of Mr Coate's hotels is up for sale. 

Pictured top: A Blue Islands aircraft.