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Dot2Dot minibuses are unloaded for £1
Robert Lea12 Jan 2009
Dot2Dot, the loss-making airport minibus taxi service has been sold — for just £1.
Dot2Dot was launched in November 2007, a big idea of National Express chief executive Richard Bowker who envisaged tourists jumping into shared Mercedes-Benz minivans to get between London's airports and the capital's hotels at £22 a time.
That appeared to be failing last summer because of low tourist numbers with the then strength of the pound.
Bowker switched Dot2Dot to focusing on ferrying banking types into and out of the City and Canary Wharf — just as the financial crisis swept up Lehman Brothers and the investment banking sector.
The failure of Dot2Dot is likely to have blown a
£7 million hole in National Express's finances. It was put up for sale in the autumn.
Today the business, which employs 150 people, was sold to a company called Corot, said to be run by a leisure industry specialist.
