Ryan Air
A friend of mine sends me interesting notes from time to time. Sometimes the notes are interesting happenings around our office. Sometimes they are tidbits about the world. The other day a message arrived bearing the “low priority” flag. Of course, that means “must read now”. Opening it up revealed this story.
Ryan Air is a fascinating example of innovation. Flying free might make up for the inconvenience of the cavity search at the airport. Even at $53 a flight, I’m in. Just when you thought all of the good ideas were owned by the web 2.0 folks, someone from the real world dreams up a big idea.
If anyone wants to send me to Europe to check it out, let me know. Hey isn’t Scoble in Europe about now? Maybe he’ll fly Ryan Air and let us know what it’s like. 
I live in Ireland (RyanAir’s home country) and I’ve used them regularly since 1998 when I spent a year living in France. They have always pitched themselves as a truly budget airline, but things are a lot stricter than they used to be.
I once managed to get a return flight from Dublin to Paris (Beauvais) for about £30 return (taxes etc included), which was perfect for me when I was a student. When I moved back from France I turned up at the airport with 7 bags and somehow managed to get checked in and not charged for the extra weight I was carrying (I was about 30lbs over the baggage limit at that time!). They have changed since those days, the charge per item of checked baggage is only a recent thing!
They are a great airline if you want dirt cheap flights to local destinations, but I don’t usually use them for anything over 2 hours of flying time. The other main inconvenience that you have to put up with is that they normally fly to small regional airports – for example they fly to about 1.5 hours north of Paris, so you have to factor in the cost of the coach and the time it takes to get you into Paris – sometimes it’s cheaper to fly with the ‘traditional’ carriers as they will get you there quicker.
Recently the state airline Aer Lingus floated on the Stock Exchange here, and Ryan Air immediately launched a take-over bid, trying to buy as much stock as possible and offering a good price for it. It’s a well run company, since they managed to have over a billion in spare cash to try and put this bid together! We’re all eagerly waiting to see if they will manage the take-over.
As with any low-cost carrier, you do have to put up with a higher than normal flight cancellation and delay rate, so there is also some risk involved with flying with them – if you HAVE to be at a destination at a certain time, then you’re better off to choose another carrier.
If you are interested in seeing one of their planes carrying the Hertz advertising, then I’ve posted a pic over on my blog – we nicknamed it the ‘Rent-a-plane’!
elly parker
29 Nov 06 at 5:01 am
I travelled Ryanair from Stanstead to Limoge a few weeks back. The experience was one of shock and horror. I have never experience such bad service, the staff treat people with contemp. You are at Stanstead because it’s a cheap flight. You are then ‘fined’ for checking in a bag. Fined for anything over 15kg. Once checked in you are herded to a holding pen until the aircraft arrives. The doors to the holding pen are opened and the mad rush begins for a good seat. Once on the aircraft the selling starts. Tea, coffee, sandwiches, then duty frees, then raffle tickets and train tickets. It’s horrid when the flight goes well but if your flight is delayed or cancelled its a nightmare. See http://www.ryanaircampaign.org for the horror stories. For me if I ever use them again I’ll travel with hand baggage only.
chris mills
1 Jan 07 at 2:42 am