As is often the case Richard Branson was browsing his Twitter feed yesterday morning, when he came across one tweet that instantly bought a smile to his face and made him press retweet.
@BecciChute: “@RichardBranson Me when I was three…And now you’re my boss 🙂”
The tweet, accompanied with the above photo, shows a young Becci Chute with her now boss, Richard Branson. Becci’s message goes to show how closely-knit a company can be, even when operating in such a global fashion as Virgin. Having taken as much enjoyment from the tale as Richard, Virgin decided to track Becci down and ask her a few questions about her and the company itself.
“The picture is of me and Richard at one of his parties in 1995, I was about three years old at the time. My mum (Samantha, pictured below with Richard) used to work for Virgin Atlantic and each year he’d have a birthday party and all the staff would go, it was a smaller company back then,” explained Becci.
“My Grandmother also worked for Virgin, which makes three generations of us! She worked for Virgin Staff Travel for 15 years. My Mum was cabin crew on Virgin Atlantic and now I’m doing the same, when she started she was Group 67 and when I started I was Group 708, it just goes to show how many people have come through in that time. “
It’s clear from the thousands of applications that inundated the Virgin Atlantic offices last month, when they announced plans to recruit extra cabin crew, that the airline is still a very desirable one to work for. So how does Becci, the latest generation of Virgin employees, feel about it?
“I absolutely love it, it’s the best job in the world. Virgin’s whole attitude is fun and friendly, I don’t think you can say that about any other airline. Virgin also still has a lot of the glamour of flying, which is what I love about it,” said Becci.
“I remember meeting Richard and thinking how huge his garden was and that he was really, really smiley! He had these gondola boats in his garden too, he was on the back of our one pushing it along the little river.” As far as first meetings with a boss go, we don’t think they come much better than that!
Visit Virgin Atlantic to see for yourself how they’re still putting the glamour back in air travel.
By Jack Preston. Content & Marketing Executive. Tweets at @JackPressedOn
Can’t quite see the same cute and cuddly story coming from a Ryanair ‘hotty’!