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ABR 2025 26(Entrepreneurial)printed 82 · PDF 96
102 pagesrevision 50940
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ticket prices with them even going
down to 5 or even 1 pounds which
further more attracts attention and such
customers.
This
initial
price
hooks
travellers, even if later hidden fees like
baggage and more would drive up the
cost.
It
also
uses
controversial
marketing especially under its CEO
Michael O Leary. Often times their ads
mock figures like politicians, rivals or
public figures such as how in 1990 they
mocked British Airlines by marketing
their flights as cheaper then even taking
a taxi to the airport, or when they
mocked Gordon Brown the UK prime
minister by mocking his air tax. However
for some more recent examples are
such as how the CEO once mentioned
paying people to use the toilet, or
making tickets cheaper but with people
having to stand up during the flight. This
approach
allowed
news
outlets
covering this news to promote them for
free Another approach Ryan Air took
was to cut out travel agents early by
aggressively promoting their website.
This allowed them to avoid paying these
travel agents and cutting down on costs.
This also allowed them to have more
freedom in their distribution costs. As
now they could fully control their loyalty
program, priority boarding, or upselling
on their other areas like luggage.
However after severe backlash, mainly
about its poor quality of services and its
many hidden fees, RyanAIr changed its
tone a bit. It launched its “Always
Getting Better” campaign in which it
advertised it changing itself for the
better.
They
backed
this
up
by
improving their website, removing the
hidden fees and started being more
transparent about themselves. They
also introduced the My RyanAir loyalty
program to get people coming back and
as such also
marketed
themselves
through
that.
However
a
critical
part
of
their
marketing strategy is the involvement of
priming
their
customers
for
their
infamous
famous
add
ons.
These
include priority boarding, seat selection,
in flight sales, etc. And nowadays almost
40% of their revenue comes from these
add ons and as such making sure that
their customers are mentally ready for
them is a vital part of their marketing
strategy.
Growth timeline:
To
really
put
into
perspective
of
RyanAirs dominance in the budget
travel market, lets take a look at how
they grew over the span of decades,
and which problems they faced + how
they solved them. We split this into 5
sections. The 1980s, 1990s, 2000s,
2010s,
and
lastly
2020s.
In
the
beginning, in 1984, RyanAir was founded
by Tony Ryan with it starting out with 1
15 seater Embraer Bandeirante which
flew on only one route from Waterford
to Gatwick. In 1986 RyanAir added the
Dublin-Luton route which resulted in
them finally challenging other airlines.
Then in 1989, even though it was
carrying around 600,000 passengers, it
faced losses and neared collapse. Then
comes the 1990s which is known as
when
they
reinvented,
specifically
under their new CEO Michael O Leary
who was appointed in 1991 and he
swiftly got to work as in 1995 RyanAir
broke 2 million passengers, establishing
itself in the market as the low cost
disruptor. Then when the EU allowed
low cost airlines to operate freely across
borders, in 1997, RyanAir started rapidly
spreading across Europe. 1998 also
marks when it was listed on the DUBLIN
and NASDAQ
82
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