Qatar Airways CEO Akbar Al Baker is one of the most interesting airline CEO in the world. He sometimes can be deadly serious in situations he is concerned while he can be funny throwing jokes.
Well, during today’s press conference at ITB Berlin 2023, there was a very funny moment with the German reporter.
Qatar Airways CEO Criticizes Lufthansa For Its Allegris Product
During the press conference, there was a Q&A time where a German reporter from a local TV station asked the CEO about Lufthansa’s recent Skytrax five-star rating loss and thoughts about the new “Allegris” products.
CEO Al Baker’s answer? It was epic and made me laugh out loud when I was watching it live on the web. As soon as the reporter finished his question he looked at Qatar Airways’ CCO Thierry Antinori baffled in confusion and replied to the reporter:
“I did not really understand your question. What is Lufthansa offering? Free tickets?”
This was surely very funny. For sure he has some humor. The reporter then clarify his question and told him again about the Allegris product.
With some questions showing from his facial expression, he said:
“Yes, I have seen it, I have seen images of it. Congratulations to him, but he is nearly 12 years behind Qatar Airways product improvement. And whilst he does that program, we are now going into our next evolution with Qatar Airways product.”
“I would love to. He’s my friend. Okay, we are adversaries in business, but he is my friend, and if he will invite me, I will certainly fly in his product, and I will tell him how many mistakes he has made.”
“Let’s see when the product will be onboard. You know, you can always announce a product, it takes ages to put the product. Do you know how long it takes to develop the seat? You know, the Qsuite that you see flying on Qatar Airways, was in development for nearly five years.”
“You should always fly on Qatar Airways, you’ll always get the best product. But you know, you can always put seats, you can put, you know, fancy stuff around the seats, but you can never deliver that human touch that Qatar Airways will give you. The passion, the hospitality, the attention, that you get on Qatar Airways, you can never get on somebody else.”
“A nice seat, privacy, you know, the partition up to the ceiling, virtual windows, it’s all good. At the end of the day, this is why you start paying so high prices against Qatar Airways, because we don’t have all this fancy rubbish on our airplanes, we have really a product people like.”
Not only he criticized Lufthansa but also prior to this answer, he also criticized the public for blaming the aviation industry for Carbon emissions and global warming. He specifically gave a very long answer about sustainable aviation fuel or SAF but he had to get it off him because he doesn’t believe in all the nonsense regarding emissions.
CEO Al Baker is a smart man however, he sometimes also gives comments that make some people hate him. I personally am a huge fan of Qatar Airways products as they offer amazing inflight service and experience but sometimes, but not all the time, I also experience disappointments too.
Qatar Airways has great seats and features, however, with most of the airlines now adopting similar or even better cabins that are not fancy, the level of interest in the Qsuite is getting lower than before.
Summary
Qatar Airways CEO Akbar Al Baker threw shade at Lufthansa in its backyard during today’s ITB Berlin 2023 press conference. He gave the audience entertaining answers while discussing about Lufthansa’s new Allegris product.
