I flew from The Netherlands to Poland on a €24 ticket booked 10 days prior! ✈️ After having read all the case studies about Southwest Airlines and how Ryanair - Europe's Favourite Airline is replicating and going one step above in the #LowCostCarrier space with their optimisations, I was very excited to fly Ryanair and see what all they are doing. 📚 For any airline, to keep the costs low, the biggest driver becomes the #TurnaroundTime, i.e., the time spent on the ground. Because the time spent on the ground is the time not spent in carrying the passengers around. ⏳ The factors that Ryanair incorporates to keep the TAT low are somewhat unique and even a step above how IndiGo (InterGlobe Aviation Ltd) and Southwest Airlines go about it. 👾 1️⃣ Flying from smaller airports - This helps them keep the security checks and boarding times shorter and give more flexibility in running their airlines from the preferred gates. 🛫 2️⃣ Multi gate entry - Like Indigo, Ryanair does not use the duct based entry which only goes through the front door and hence takes a longer time to board and deboard the passengers. 🚪 3️⃣ No bus transport - Running from smaller airports, Ryanair can also keep the aircrafts closer to the boarding gates, such that customers don't have to board a bus to take them to the aircraft. Buses create a bottleneck in boarding as a single bus will only start after a certain number of passengers have collected. 🚌 4️⃣ Limited cabin luggage space - When the cabin luggage space above the seats is lesser, customers either bring lesser luggage in hand or keep the luggage under the seats. This helps keep the aisle clear while boarding and deboarding. 💼 5️⃣ Paid luggage space - To further incentivize the customers to keep the hand luggage small, the airline keeps very strict rules on the size of the bag that a customer can carry and make any extra/bigger hand luggage paid. 🛅 6️⃣ No seat pockets - There are no baskets to keep catalogs and/or your used cups and plates behind the seat in front of you. This disincentivizes the customer to leave behind any trash which would have to be cleared later, hence taking more time between two rides. Indigo tries to solve for it by their cabin crew specifically looking at trash in the baskets while doing the trash collection rounds. 💺 7️⃣ Safety Instructions in One Language - Since regulation states that safety instructions demonstration has to be given out to the passengers, the airline still does it, but since the demo has to be done when the flight is still on the ground, to reduce the time they do it in only one language (English, on a flight from Netherlands to Poland). 🅰️ I understand most of these factors make the overall flight experience less premium for the customers, with all the walking to aircraft, not having a good luggage, not getting the instructions in their language, but Ryanair understands that what they are selling is not a premium airlines, but a low-cost one! ✨
Couldn’t agree more Aditya! When it comes to Airline like business, it’s very imperative to optimise each of these factors you mentioned. I also think, that your flight routes selection, destination frequency, service time after each flight, staff readiness etc. also play a pivotal role in keeping up with the least time on ground and maximum flying time with proper ensured safety and compliance.
This connects all the airline cases we studied. Very helpful Aditya Raj Agarwal
Very insightful Aditya Raj Agarwal
Thanks Aditya Raj Agarwal , few of the points above are unique and not covered by Southwest.
Great insights Aditya Raj Agarwal
Love this Aditya Raj Agarwal!
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4moAlso, in an interview Michael (Ryanair's CEO) mentioned that they were trying to do away with the last 10 rows and make it a standing cabin. His claims were that they will keep it at €1, and will be filled first. And people won't mind standing on a 2hr flight. And similarly, do away with washrooms as well, and keep just 1