Sir Stelios Hadji-Yiannas recently said: business leader‘s podcast, Off to Lunch, explains how and why he got into this job. easy My travels in the ’90s, and the intervening 30 years, have seen a wider world. easy The Brand family and his Stelios Charitable Foundation are truly “taking off.”
Perhaps best known as the founder of EasyJet airlines, Lord Stelios got his start on the high seas rather than in the skies as owner of his own transport company, Stelmar. However, shipping companies were not customer-facing and felt too anonymous for the ambitious young stereos. Not content to “just” continue with his family’s familiar business, he wanted to create a well-known consumer brand.
It was a “Road to Damascus” trip to the United States that led to his decision to take on the airline, a national heritage that had a virtual monopoly on European skies in the mid-1990s. He decided to study a low-cost model invented in the United States, where commercial airlines were already competing. “How much can I buy a plane for?” he asked Boeing, “which airline should I talk to?” This conversation led to him taking his first low-cost flight on Southwest Airlines, and his first We stayed at the Motel 6, a cheap hotel. So he started thinking about starting a brand that would cover both airline tickets and accommodations, and that would promote “value for money.” After StelMar, he tried StelAir before settling down. easy. “The rest is history,” he said.
Investment from his father helped get things “on track.” But on day one, easyJet wasn’t a real airline. It was more of a travel agency, selling tickets for flights operated by an independent airline, GB Airways. The plane was leased, there were no frills, nothing was free. “My claim to fame was selling my first cup of coffee on a plane for 25p,” he laughed. “You can’t do everything well,” the Monaco resident freely admits, so he leaves airlines to the people in the business, a philosophy he has applied to most industries he has worked in since. I took it in.
What young Stelios did well instead was marketing and selling directly to the public. This was also a world first.
It’s newsworthy that flights cost 29p instead of hundreds of pounds.
Sir Stelios Hadji-Iannas
EasyJet is such an established player in today’s aviation industry that it’s sometimes easy to forget just how much Sir Stelios’ low-cost airline has revolutionized European air travel. Market disruption was the name of the game. Traditional airlines achieved high prices because of their high costs. The idea was to almost halve these prices, which meant halving the cost of operating flights… So he wanted to reduce the cost of operating flights such as London Heathrow and Roissy-Charles de Gaulle. We avoided expensive “hub airports” and ran national newspaper ads for special deals and discounts with seats. In some cases on sale for 29p! At a time when flights could be maintained even if two-thirds of the seats were empty, changing prices when the seats were full was a novel idea.
EasyJet doesn’t need to poach British Airways passengers. A new market was created and grew in response to the demand of people who previously could not afford to travel by plane within Europe. The company was listed on the London Stock Exchange for five years from almost the day after its first flight. Sir Stelios believes that five years is the turning point for a business to be considered sustainable.
bumpy ride
There was some turmoil along the way for the first five years. Due to delays in the supply of aircraft, flights were canceled for his two months. British Airways launched its own low-cost airline, Go, as a direct competitor, but its launch was gatecrashed by Sir Stelios and other EasyJet staff, and its first flight had a unique atmosphere. It appeared in easy An orange boiler suit, a somewhat cheeky but highly effective publicity stunt. For the record, Go was eventually acquired by easyJet. 9/11 also happened around this time…
Lord Stelios played the “David and Goliath” card, but the airline’s success quickly shelved this approach. He also used the legal process to “keep British Airways honest”, particularly regarding unfair competition.
When asked if he thought Goh was a real threat at the time, he said: and supported the low-cost model as safe and acceptable. ”
free publicity
and came Airlines EasyJet behind-the-scenes documentary released in 1998. Only EastEnders and Coronation Street had more viewers in the UK.
Lord Stelios believes the aviation industry is particularly media-friendly and gets “a lot more attention than it deserves”, so by agreeing to the series, which ran for several years, many I ended up getting free publicity. He believes it was the right decision because it was innovative at the time, but he wouldn’t do it now. “It’s the kind of thing you do when you’re young and little.” It was “warts and all,” but the show easy Reach 12 million households every week with your brand on prime-time television. “You can’t buy brand recognition like that,” he insists.
“The baby’s getting bigger.”
Lord Stelios stepped down as non-executive chairman of easyJet in the early 2000s, but he and his family remain major shareholders in the airline. “The city wanted an independent chairman, but I owned the easyJet brand so there was a conflict of interest,” explains the founder. Since he owns his easyGroup brand and receives royalties for the brand, he felt it was “justifiable not to be on the board.” He also believes that having a separate named CEO or chairman is a sign of a company’s maturity. “The baby has grown,” he says, and he has found a “happy medium” of being involved and profiting from the company, but he doesn’t run it day-to-day. The relationship with EasyJet’s management has been complicated at times in the past, but they have congratulated them on how they have led the company’s recovery post-COVID-19 in a particularly challenging industry. He feels that this should be done.
Was there ever a moment of doubt? Secretly, he admits, yes. For example, in mid-2020, when airlines were grounded due to the coronavirus pandemic… But “it’s incredible how quickly you can recover from a very difficult situation,” the billionaire said. claim.
Since quitting easyJet, the billionaire has: easy Family of other domains. He now runs easyGroup, the private company that runs the brand, which takes up about a third of his time, including working in court to stop people from using it. is spent. easy Branding without permission. There are two reasons for this. The first is to protect consumers from confusion.There are many people who are serious easy Customers may be fooled into trusting the “easyABC” brand. easy In reality, easyGroup has no control over its company standards. The second reason is the rule of law. All of the Group’s 1,200 trademarks have legal functions similar to property rights and copyrights.
Another third of his time is spent on active trading strategies for stocks and options. Given his success, he feels obligated to invest in other areas outside of his brand. And the last third of his time has been devoted to giving back to society, including through the Young Entrepreneurs Award, the charity he founded, and partnerships with other charities such as the Prince’s Trust, the Red Cross and the Prince Albert II Foundation. It is related to giving back to
Young entrepreneurs are now learning from him, and he was asked what he learned from his father, his first and only boss. “There are a lot of good things. He had an entrepreneurial spirit and was good at timing the market.” Sir Stelios said that in many industries, it’s about timing your entry into an asset and knowing when to exit. I explained that this is important. “But he was also very old-fashioned and didn’t know how to delegate at all.”
Asked if his father supported the airline idea, Sir Stelios said he was proud his son wanted to go out and build a brand. He flew for the airline and was proud of the airline his son had created. However, he would complain about the quality of the coffee. In response, Stelios said, “Dad, they can’t fly with us because of coffee. They can’t fly with us because of price.”
Giving back and creating jobs
“For many years we have run an Entrepreneurship Awards scheme in every country I call home, including the UK,” said the billionaire philanthropist of his foundation. He finds the Leonard Cheshire Disability Award and its recipients to be very inspiring, but it is a narrow field. He therefore wanted to create a new award system in parallel to encourage young people to start businesses with the aim of creating jobs.
He has sought to overcome division in Cyprus by presenting awards to Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots who are creating jobs, prosperity, trust and, hopefully, moving towards lasting peace. During and after Greece’s economic crisis, his foundation provided significant support to businesses. At the “other end of the scale,” the Foundation has provided food to those in desperate need.
Asked what skills he thought entrepreneurs need, Lord Stelios said that while it is clear that capital can be raised through other means, people who want to be their own boss and take financial risks with their own money I answered that I needed someone with determination. He expands his business as he himself did. And he has to be able to deal with the fact that he either wins or loses.
What is his best advice for people starting out? “I’m primarily known for marketing ideas and promoting businesses and brands, but it’s important to have a good accountant and a good lawyer on your side… Don’t underestimate the need for monthly managed accounts. “Focus on marketing and most of it is done online, so if that’s not your area of expertise, hire someone to do it for you. Then go out and find customers,” he concludes. I said it as.