Re: Ryanair Low Cost
Tacio Allaire
Ryanair is an Irish ultra low-cost carrier group headquartered in Swords, Dublin, Ireland.[12] The parent company Ryanair Holdings plc includes subsidiaries Ryanair DACTooltip Designated activity company,[13] Malta Air, Buzz, Lauda Europe and Ryanair UK. Ryanair DAC, the oldest airline of the group, was founded in 1984.[11] Ryanair Holdings was established in 1996 as a holding company for Ryanair with the two companies having the same board of directors and executive officers.[14] In 2019 the transition began from the airline Ryanair and its subsidiaries into separate sister airlines under the holding company.[15] Later in 2019 Malta Air joined Ryanair Holdings.[16]
Ryanair has been characterised by its rapid expansion, a result of the deregulation of the aviation industry in Europe in 1997 and the success of its low-cost business model. The group operates more than 500 planes.[17] Its route network serves over 40 countries in Europe, North Africa (Morocco, Canary Islands), and the Middle East (Israel and Jordan).[18] The primary operational bases are at Dublin, London Stansted and Milan Bergamo airports.[19] Ryanair is Ireland's biggest airline[20] and in 2016 became the world's largest airline by scheduled international passengers.[21]
The company has at times been criticised for its refusal to issue invoices for the VAT-exempt services it provides (airfares),[22] poor working conditions,[23][24][25] heavy use of extra charges,[26][27][28] poor customer service,[29][30] and tendency to intentionally generate controversy in order to gain publicity.[31][32][33]
Since its establishment in 1984,[11] Ryanair has grown from a small airline, flying the short journey from Waterford to London Gatwick, into Europe's largest carrier. There have been over 19,000 people working for the company, most employed and contracted by agencies to fly on Ryanair aircraft.[34][35]
Ryanair was founded in 1984 as "Danren Enterprises"[11] by Christopher Ryan, Liam Lonergan (owner of Irish travel agent Club Travel), and Irish businessman Tony Ryan, founder of Guinness Peat Aviation.[39][40] The airline was shortly renamed "Ryanair".[11] It began operations in 1985 flying a 15-seat Embraer Bandeirante turboprop aircraft between Waterford and Gatwick Airport.[41][42]
In 1986, the company added a second route from Dublin to Luton, thus directly competing with the Aer Lingus/British Airways duopoly for the first time. Under partial European Economic Community (EEC) deregulation, airlines could begin new international intra-EEC services as long as one of the two governments approved (the so-called "double-disapproval" regime). The Irish government at the time refused its approval to protect Aer Lingus, but Britain, under Margaret Thatcher's deregulating Conservative government, approved the service. With two routes and two aircraft, the fledgling airline carried 82,000 passengers in one year.[45][44][46]
In 1986, the directors of Ryanair took an 85% stake in London European Airways. From 1987, this provided a connection with the Luton Ryanair service onward to Amsterdam and Brussels.[47] In 1988, London European operated as Ryanair Europe and later began to operate charter services.[48][49] That same year, Michael O'Leary joined the company as chief financial officer.[50] In 1989, a Short Sandringham was operated with Ryanair sponsorship titles but never flew revenue-generating services for the airline.[51]
In 1994, Michael O'Leary became the sixth chief executive officer.[55] Ryan clashed with O'Leary, with Ryan wanting the airline's PR stunts to be less aggressive, and O'Leary suggesting that Ryan should leave the board.[56]
The airline launched its website in 2000, with online booking initially said to be a small and unimportant part of the software supporting the site. Increasingly online booking contributed to the aim of cutting flight prices by selling directly to passengers and excluding the costs imposed by travel agents. Within a year, the website was handling three-quarters of all bookings. By December 2023 the website hit 40M monthly visits.[57]
Ryanair launched a new base of operation in Charleroi Airport in 2001. Later that year, the airline ordered 155 new 737-800 aircraft from Boeing at what was believed to be a substantial discount, to be delivered over eight years from 2002 to 2010.[58] Approximately 100 of these aircraft had been delivered by the end of 2005, although there were slight delays in late 2005 caused by production disruptions arising from a Boeing machinists' strike.[59]
The rapid addition of new routes and new bases has enabled growth in passenger numbers and made Ryanair among the largest carriers on European routes. In August 2005, the airline claimed to have carried 20% more passengers within Europe than British Airways.[63]
On 13 February 2006, Britain's Channel 4 broadcast a documentary as part of its Dispatches series, "Ryanair caught napping". The documentary criticised Ryanair's training policies, security procedures and aircraft hygiene, and highlighted poor staff morale. Ryanair denied the allegations[65] and claimed that promotional materials, in particular a photograph of a stewardess sleeping, had been faked by Dispatches.[66]
In August 2007, the company started charging passengers to check in at the airport, therefore reversing its policy of paying for online check-in. It says that cutting airport check-in reduces overhead costs.[72][73]
In 2009, Ryanair announced that it was in talks with Boeing and Airbus about an order that could include up to 200 aircraft. Even though Ryanair had dealt with Boeing aircraft up to that point, Michael O'Leary said he would buy Airbus aircraft if it offered a better deal. Airbus Chief Commercial Officer John Leahy denied in February 2009 that any negotiations were taking place.[82]
On 21 February 2009, Ryanair confirmed it was planning to close all check-in desks by the start of 2010. Michael O'Leary, Ryanair's chief executive, said passengers would be able to leave their luggage at a bag drop, but everything else would be done online. This became reality in October 2009.[83]
In November 2009, Ryanair announced that negotiations with Boeing had proceeded poorly and that Ryanair was thinking of stopping the negotiations, then putting at 200 aircraft for delivery between 2013 and 2016, and simply returning cash to shareholders.[85] Boeing's competitor Airbus was mentioned again as an alternative vendor for Ryanair, but both Michael O'Leary and Airbus CCO John Leahy dismissed this.[86] In December 2009, Ryanair confirmed that negotiations with Boeing had indeed failed. Plans were to take all 112 aircraft already on order at that point, with the last deliveries occurring in 2012, for a total fleet of over 300. Ryanair confirmed that an agreement had been met on price, but it had failed to agree on conditions, as Ryanair had wanted to carry forward certain conditions from its previous contract.[87]
In April 2010, after a week of flight disruption in Europe caused by the 2010 eruptions of Eyjafjallajkull in Iceland, Ryanair decided to end refusals to comply with EU regulations which stated it was obliged to reimburse stranded passengers.[88] In a company statement released on 22 April 2010, Ryanair described the regulations as 'unfair'. On 29 April 2010, Ryanair cancelled all of its routes from Budapest Liszt Ferenc Airport after talks with the airport's management on reducing fees failed. As the airport is the only one serving Budapest, there is no lower-cost airport nearby. In June 2010, Ryanair called for the Irish government to scrap its tourist tax, implying it was destroying tourism in Ireland.[89] In August 2010, Ryanair held a press conference in Plovdiv and announced its first-ever Bulgarian destination connecting Plovdiv with London Stansted. The service was planned to start in November 2010 with two flights weekly.[90] In late 2010, Ryanair began withdrawing all routes from its smallest base, Belfast City, and Shannon due to increased airport fees.[91]
In March 2011, Ryanair opened a new maintenance hangar at Glasgow Prestwick International Airport, making it Ryanair's biggest fleet maintenance base. In June 2011, Ryanair and COMAC signed an agreement to cooperate on the development of the C-919, a Boeing 737 competitor.[93]
On 19 June 2012, Ryanair Chief Executive Michael O'Leary announced his intention to make an all-cash offer for Aer Lingus. The bid was blocked by the European Commission in 2017, which had also blocked an earlier bid.[95]
On 25 October 2013, Ryanair announced what it described as a series of "customer service improvements", to take place over the next six months. These included lower fees for reprinting boarding passes, free changes of minor errors on bookings within 24 hours, and a free second small carry-on bag. Ryanair said it was making the changes as a result of customer feedback.[98]
In November 2016, Ryanair launched a new package holiday service named Ryanair Holidays. The new service offers flights, accommodation, and transfer packages. The service was launched in Ireland, the United Kingdom and Germany, with other markets to follow.[104] Ryanair partnered with Spain-based tour operator, Logitravel, and accommodation provider, World2Meet, to create Ryanair Holidays.[105]
In April 2017, Ryanair started issuing tickets for connecting flights, meaning if a connection is missed, the customer will be rebooked at no extra cost and compensated according to the EU Flight Compensation Regulation. To begin with, such tickets were only sold for flights with connections at Rome-Fiumicino airport.[106][107]
In 2017, the company announced plans to add 50 new aircraft to its fleet every year for the next five years, aiming to reach 160 million passengers by the early 2020s, up from 120 million passengers.[108]
For over a decade, Ryanair had only operated with its Irish Air Operator's Certificate and solely under the Ryanair brand. However, starting in 2018 the airline began introducing additional brands and operating on multiple certificates in different countries.
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