Re:Joe Sutter, who guided creation of the Boeing 747, has died
by WalterBright on Friday September 02, 2016 @02:53AM
(#12411364)
If you buy one for prestige purposes, of course you're going to lose money. Airplanes only make money when they're packed with payload. An airplane sitting on the ground, or flying half-full, is going to lose money like a firehose drains a tank. But if your logistics are set up to keep the 747 flying as close as possible to 24/7 packed with payload, you can make a crapton of money, which is why Boeing was selling so many.
Quite the opposite for most of the 1970s and much of the 1980s. Many smaller national airlines such as Aer Lingus, Air Canada and Sabena bought the 747 for the 'prestige' and its range, but struggled to make any money from it and eventually ditched it for smaller trijets and twins.
KLM managed to keep going by flying them in Combi configuration with half of the main deck given over to cargo.