Insider Media Limited

Low-cost airline Bmibaby will be focusing on "dominating" the Midlands airspace over the next few years, managing director Julian Carr has told Insider.

He said the airline pulled out of flying from Manchester and Cardiff earlier this year after fears it was spreading itself too thin and cited tough competition as a reason for pulling out of the north of England.

"The Midlands is where we are strongest - it's our heartland and it's where we have grown as a company," said Carr. "We're a relatively small airline on a global stage and want to make sure we dominate the Midlands rather than try and have a small presence in several locations."

Earlier this year, the Derby-headquartered subsidiary of Lufthansa-owned Bmi announced it would be axing its flights from Cardiff and Manchester, and instead concentrate on its offerings from Birmingham and East Midlands airports.

"Manchester is a great gateway for passengers from the north – a fantastic airport," said Carr. "But it was very hard to stand out from the other airlines there – we are small in that we only have two planes flying from Manchester, and couldn't have the same sort of impact as others."

Carr also dismissed rival airline Ryanair's proposals to start charging passengers to use the on-board toilets and creating cut-price standing tickets as "a PR stunt".

"It was, to be blunt, just a stunt. There may have been an element of seriousness to that; I really can't see it happening. It's certainly not something we'd look to do – we're going the other way in that we're developing our services rather than restricting them."

He added that the days of snobbery towards low-cost airlines had lessened dramatically.

"It's definitely faded to an extent – just paying for what you want and use is very attractive to passengers. Why pay over the odds when you can have the same experience, same destination with a low-cost carrier? I think a lot of people have realised the logic in that over the past few years."