What happened was that after that big fuel depot explosion in the UK some months ago, airlines were warned that until the facility was rebuilt, they would not be able to fill their tanks to the brim in the UK but would have to make do with only 80% of their fuel requirements.
This caused an enormous problem for SAA because it simply could not fly directly from London to Johannesburg or Cape Town without full fuel tanks. So, it has had to make a stopover in Milan, Italy, to top up for the return journey.
What has irked SAA is that this restriction, according to their ad, only applies to foreign airlines and British Airways and Virgin can get their full complements of fuel at Heathrow to make a non-stop flights to South Africa. Which is obviously an enormous marketing advantage.
What I found amusing about this whole issue is that at last SAA is finding out what it is like to be on the receiving end when an airline persuades its government to be dog-in-the-manger and go one up on its foreign competitors.
For years SAA has talked our Government into not allowing British Airways, Virgin and others too many flights to SA just to protect their market share.
On top of which SAA have also been very much against charter flights operating into South Africa.
But, the worst case of dog-in-the-manger from SAA was about a decade ago when BMW South Africa was launching a new Three-series car using the British Airways Concorde to fly guests between Johannesburg and Cape Town.
When this plan was mooted and permission was sought to bring Concorde to South Africa, BMW was told in no uncertain terms that SAA would not agree unless the British Airways livery on Concorde was changed to SAA signage on the side that would be seen by onlookers at Jo'burg International and Cape Town airports.
Thankfully, Government did not fall for that most arrogant and audacious of requests and probably had one look at how much the motor industry meant to the SA economy and told SAA to get stuffed.
Undoubtedly, there is a lot of marketing advantage to be gained by getting some sort of co-operation from government.
Clearly the British government had no qualms about imposing a very one-sided and unfair aviation fuel policy. After all, they had to somehow make up for the huge loss that fuel depot disaster cost the country.
Getting back to BMW South Africa as an example of this sort of marketing leverage, there is no doubt that its now massively successful export business would not have got off the ground had it not been for government getting involved in the initial marketing of it all.
After having been told by BMW dealers in Australia that there was "no way in hell" they would ever agree to sell South African made BMW's in Australia, the then deputy President, FW De Klerk, flew to Australia and managed to persuade the dealers to change their minds. He did a huge amount of homework before the trip and did an outstanding marketing job.
Equally, former President Mandela as well as President Mbeki have done a massive amount of marketing for South African companies - more than anyone can imagine.
