Boss who built Jet2 stands down...
The business news that matters
The man who built Jet2 from a small cargo airline into the biggest package holiday provider in the UK is stepping down from the board. Philip Meeson was an award-winning aerobatics pilot before buying Jet2 in 1983. Today the company is valued at £2.5 billion after a surge in its share price over the last decade, as the graph below shows…
Jet2 overtook TUI to become the largest tour operator in February this year, according to ATOL data. The company is based at Leeds Bradford Airport and has focused on offering European holiday flights from regional airports across the UK.
Jet2’s latest annual results, which have also been published today, show that revenue more than tripled to £5 billion in the year ending March 31, up from £1.2 billion in the previous year, which was disrupted by Covid-19. Jet2 flew 16.22 million passengers during the year, with 64.9 per cent of those on holiday packages. The rise in revenues meant Jet2 swung from a pre-tax loss of £389 million last year to a profit of £371 million.
Meeson, 75, is currently executive chairman but will become non-executive chairman and then step down when a successor is appointed. He said in a statement:
"I am extremely proud of the business I and colleagues have developed over the past 40 years and have huge respect for the newly enlarged board and the outstanding management team that over recent years has built up Jet2holidays to become the largest package holiday provider in the UK, together with Jet2.com, the UK's third largest airline…
“I therefore remain confident in the outlook for the group, but I am conscious of my age and the need to plan an orderly succession. I remain committed to Jet2 and will support my successor and the management in any way I can."
Shares in Jet2 have fallen more than 10 per cent today following the announcement. Meeson is still the biggest shareholder in the company and owns 18.3 per cent.
Meeson has not given many interviews over the years. Before going into business he was an RAF pilot, however Meeson said he left after they tried to get him to fly bombers. In a 2007 interview with the Manchester Evening News he said: “We had a bit of a row about that and I left. I was a bit cocky.”
Meeson then made money selling imported Citroen cars in London before running his own flying aerobatics team that was sponsored by Marlboro. He was a member of British Aerobatics and was named national champion five times, as the records show here.
Meeson bought Express Air Services, which was then the name for Jet2, in 1983. At the time it flew between the Channel Islands and London. The company expanded its cargo services, floated on the stock market in 1988 and was renamed Dart Group. The first Jet2.com passenger flight was from Leeds Bradford to Amsterdam in February 2003. You can find more details about the company’s history here. Meeson was spoken to by police in 2009 after shouting at airport staff in Manchester about the queues for passengers. More on that here
In that 2007 interview he spoke about why Jet2.com was launched, saying:
"What we do well is provide cost-effective and safe transportation with no frills. Passengers want the lowest fares possible.”
You can find the interview in full here
Other stories that matter…
1. Gary Neville says that law firms Pinsent Masons and Hill Dickinson have agreed to pay a new record rent for office space in Manchester as part of a deal to occupy his St Michael’s development. The law firms are paying around £43 per square foot according to Place North West. Pinsent Masons is taking 26,842 sq ft while Hill Dickinson is taking 18,192 sq ft. Neville’s Relentless Developments is working on the £400 million project with private equity firm KKR, development firm Salboy and Manchester City Council. As well as offices it also includes a hotel, restaurants and a new public square. Story here
2. The government-backed British Business Bank has launched a £200 million fund to invest in small and medium-sized businesses in the south-west of England. Story here
3. Meta, the owner of Facebook and Instagram, has now launched its rival to Twitter, which is called Threads. You can download it here. Ironically, Threads is top of the UK trending charts on Twitter. Adam Mosseri, the boss of Instagram, said in an interview: “Our hope is that Threads is an open, friendly place for public conversations. particularly focused on creators.” You can find that interview here
4. The UK needs to improve the management of its state institutions according to a new column in the Financial Times by Robert Shrimsley. “Whitehall needs more technologists, project managers and data scientists,” he writes. You can read the column here. On a similar note, I thought this was an interesting Twitter post…
5. The Thinking in Bets newsletter by former American poker player Annie Duke analyses decision-making and dealing with uncertainty. In her latest post she has picked out Grimsby Town’s chairman and owner Jason Stockwood as a case study after he wrote in The Guardian about the importance of taking emotions out of decision-making. Stockwood is a tech entrepreneur who was chief executive of insurance firm Simply Business for nearly a decade and co-founded venture capital firm 53 Degrees Capital. On taking strategic decisions in football, Stockwood writes:
“It should be the output of a process of slowing down, assessing options, seeking comparables and taking the chance to seek diverse opinions and data before setting the long-distance course and destination.”
You can find his Guardian piece here and the Thinking in Bets analysis here
Stockwood is from Grimsby and has also written eloquently about levelling-up the UK economy. “I believe successful people owe it to post-industrial towns to bring skills back home to try to rejuvenate them,” he wrote in The Times. “The consequences of not doing so are enormous. If people don’t see capitalism working for them, they will stop believing democracy works.” You can find that piece here
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Best
Graham