Yes, RyanAir CEO Michael O'Leary is not your typical sensitive new age bloke. He's actually pretty brutal with customers and treats them like dirt for the most part, because he thinks as long as they continue to be cheap people will continue to use the service no matter how they are treated. In this economy most of us can't afford to be pampered in business or first class all the time.
RyanAir CEO Michael O'Leary
It brings about an interesting question though. How much will we as customers endure for a cheap deal/affordability? Ryanair has often been caught up in bad publicity for all these cost cutting measures (some actual, some proposed), some of which border on the ridiculous. Eg:
- save costs by only having one pilot and eliminating a co-pilot
- generate revenue from "optional extras", such as: a) charging to go to the toilet (not yet implemented but planned); b) charging for checked luggage (now every US domestic airline is doing it); c) charging to print boarding passes (60 euro per pass); d) charging 100 euro to check bags in at airport instead of fast bag drop beforehand; e) charging for food (now every US domestic airline is doing it)
- generate revenue by proposing that passengers fly "standing up" but restrained by seat belts, to increase space
- increased prices by 1 pound because it was forced by a European court to provide wheelchairs for disabled passengers. RyanAir argued that airports should bear the cost instead
- increased prices by 2 pounds because it was forced by civil aviation authorities to provide meals and accommodation for passengers stranded where it was RyanAir's fault
Basically RyanAir operates on a very simple business model - cheap cheap cheap. They pick small airports well outside major cities to keep landing fees low and offer very low fares. But in this case you get what you pay for, and you are treated like you are a cheapskate - rudely and adversarially.
They nickel and dime you for every little thing and pass every cost increase to the customer. Their argument is they have to do this to keep prices low, and that customers don't care how they are treated as long as they get to fly cheap. In other words - the ultimate cattle class. If you don't want to be charged a boarding pass fee, then print your boarding pass beforehand. If you don't want to pay for food, then don't eat. If you don't want to pay the checked bag fee, then don't check bags in. Etc.
Thoughts on this? Is this business model sustainable in the long term? Or are they building a scenario where people will only go to them as long as they are a) cheap and b) deliver their promise ie not have constantly delayed flights etc. Because one thing that seems to be missing here is customer loyalty.