Las Vegas Weekly

June 16, 2010 · 2:06 PM

Photos: Sir Richard Branson bets $110 million on travel to Las Vegas

By Robin Leach

Sir Richard Branson at the Bellagio on June 16, 2010.

Photo: Darrin Bush/Las Vegas News Bureau

Sir Richard Branson’s bet on expanded air service from Britain to Las Vegas is about $110 million, and “we’re not stopping,” he said this morning at the Bellagio, where for the first time ever, he rode in on jet skis at the Fountains Lake to conduct “Fly Me to the Moon” to the dancing waters.

The deal for new twice-weekly service from Manchester to McCarran was four years in the making, Rossi Ralenkotter of the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority told me, and Virgin Atlantic marketing managers said the startup before the first flight March 28 is a 15-month window.

“By the time the first flight takes off, we’re in for about $110 million with the plane, the staffing, the marketing and sales effort, but tickets are already selling quickly” Sir Richard said proudly. “We see a real pent-up demand from the North of England.”

He said 12 hotels on the Strip, including Aria, where he stayed, Flamingo, Excalibur, Luxor, MGM Grand and Planet Hollywood are partners in the Virgin holiday travel packages. Virgin execs told me that the Web site is briskly selling seven-nights center Strip hotel stays and round-trip airfare for $2,500 per couple.

“We’re going to start twice weekly, but I see it going to seven days a week quite quickly,” Richard added. “This new route from Manchester to Las Vegas will be our 33rd, and we’re not stopping. Las Vegas is our fourth most successful route, and we’ve brought over 2 million passengers during our 10 years from England, with $1 billion in revenues directly to Las Vegas.”

He revealed that he’s expanding his domestic Virgin America routes, which also currently serve Las Vegas from San Francisco and L.A. He pledged to add a New York to Las Vegas run before year’s end.

Rossi chimed in: “This is a great day for Las Vegas. We have a great relationship with Virgin and Sir Richard. The research shows that the average spent per passenger from Britain per stay is $825, with $500,000 in gaming revenues added in the past decade. The British flights are our No. 1 international market. Add in the United Kingdom with Canada and Mexico flights, and that’s 70 percent of our total international business.”

When the Virgin flights begin from Manchester with regular service the first week of April, there will be a total of nine flights a week from Britain. That’s 40,000 passengers a year, a 30 percent increase of Virgin’s current capacity inbound here.

“It was a long-held ambition of mine to fly into Las Vegas when I started the airline,” Richard said. “I knew the British would love direct access to the Entertainment Capital of the World.”

The new service was announced as part of Virgin’s 10th anniversary of service from London to Las Vegas and was marked with yesterday’s ceremonies upon arrival, with burlesque queen Dita Von Teese posing on the nose of the aircraft and being carried on the wing by Richard. Our Merry Mayor of Mirth Oscar Goodman and his showgirls welcomed the madcap multimillionaire.

“It’s a real milestone and definitely worthy of celebrating. There is no better place to party,” Richard said. Tonight, Dita and he host a party at Moon in the Palms, and they have surprise entertainment up their sleeves.

Said Dita: “The pinup girl as aircraft nose art is a classic part of aviation history, so it’s amazing for me to see myself depicted on a plane. I hope passengers around the world who fly onboard it enjoy seeing me as Virgin’s flying lady pinup.”

Even though he captains a worldwide conglomerate of 200 companies ranging from British trains, Europe and Australia cheap air service, Virgin Mobile and Virgin Galactic, the world’s first commercial space tourism operator with 35,000 employees, Richard, 60, remains a daredevil at heart. He proved it by donning a long-tailed tuxedo to ride the first jet ski permitted at the Bellagio lake this morning.

Thousands of tourists stopped to watch the stunt, and Richard pulled a volunteer Virgin flight attendant onto the jet ski for his farewell wave around the lake -- but both toppled into the water! As we reported this morning, Richard last night appeared onstage in Cirque du Soleil’s Viva Elvis at Aria.

Virgin is investing more than $2 billion in 10 A330 aircraft, and one will be used on the new Manchester flights here. Virgin is spending another $70 million on state-of-the-art Panasonic Avionics technology.

Said Richard: “Passengers will be able to email, make phone calls, use their iPhones and mobiles and text message. It’s the first full connectivity, plus 300 hours of entertainment to choose from. It will be as if you never left Earth. What you take for granted on the ground will now be possible in the air at 35,000 feet.

“The possibilities now are unlimited. We won’t allow ringing cell phones, but there will be silent alerts right at the passenger’s seat. We might eventually adopt silent zones if necessary -- we’ll see how it goes. But this means the businessman, the lawyer, the accountant, the CEO now is never out of touch. We’ve proved our train riders can add four work hours to the day when traveling with us. Now it will be no different in the air on Virgin.

“Las Vegas was the right place to announce the new technology on the new flights because it is the Entertainment Capital of the World.”

Robin Leach has been a journalist for more than 50 years and has spent the past decade giving readers the inside scoop on Las Vegas, the world’s premier platinum playground.

Follow Robin Leach on Twitter at Twitter.com/Robin_Leach.

Follow Vegas DeLuxe on Twitter at Twitter.com/vegasdeluxe.

Follow VDLX Editor Don Chareunsy on Twitter at Twitter.com/VDLXEditorDon.

Share This