Cheap fares may be over but no frills stays
The fun stuff was the lunch with the FT. Not a word about a shift of strategy.
Eventually, I make out the words on the wrapper and blurt: “Oh! A bagel!”
“It’s got pesto,” says O’Leary. “It was either that or McDonald’s. I figured you for a bagel girl.”
The staff get another pasting as he moves on to talk about management consultants (“should all be euthanised”) and MBAs (“bullshit”). “MBA students come out with, ‘The customer’s always right,? he says, adopting a whiny voice. “Horseshit! The customer’s usually wrong! And, ‘My staff is my most important asset.’ Bullshit! Staff is usually your biggest cost!”It is hard to say how serious he is about this….
The real stuff is the noisy pull-out of a deal with Boeing .
RYANAIR SAID yesterday it had pulled out of talks to buy 200 aircraft from Boeing and would now trim investment from 2011 to cut costs and free up cash to pay to investors, lifting its shares.
For The Times, this means a brake on cheap fares.
RYANAIR SAID yesterday it had pulled out of talks to buy 200 aircraft from Boeing and would now trim investment from 2011 to cut costs and free up cash to pay to investors, lifting its shares
.
But ending no frills? Fat chance.
“A few days later, I get a letter from O’Leary, thanking me for taking the time to come to Dublin to see him and hoping I enjoyed my “five-star gourmet lunch”. By the way, he adds: “I forgot to charge you for the coffee, so you owe me one.” ”
Love him or hate him you can’t deny he has a wicked sense of “humour”. He sounds like my sort of man!
This quite humorously underscores managements responsibility to its shareholders, something lost on many other organizations, especially recently. Its easy to see why investors get excited about Mr O’Leary – not that he brings many new skills to the table that Irish small contractors or small farmers haven’t used for years. The only difference here is the arena and the audience.
I’m tired of hearing people whining about Ryanair. There’s an easy way to avoid their bullshit – don’t use them and pay the additional premium required to be treated a bit better than cattle.
It’s also quite remarkable how the negative and beligerant attitude of the leader of the organization has perculated through the ranks of the company. No doubt because it’s easier to emulate this behaviour than the opposite, especially when the opposite is absent.
But like Comrade has mentioned, if your not happy with any of it, there are alternatives.
Well, lets make sure we keep our alternatives.
He’s tried to shut aer arann and buy aerlingus.
And if you want to know what his prices would be like if he had a monopoly then just look at them when he does have one.
Like he has a monopoly now and then if you want to fly to a sports weekend. €500.
And a monopoly if you want to log on and alter the name on your ticket. €100.
Unfortunately for O’Leary, Airbus and Boeing have a duopoly – the next best thing to a monopoly. He tried to bully Airbus and they told him to do one.
Now Boeing was a monopoly. And as he headed off the tarmac at Seattle the Yanks thought of a nice fat number he could take or leave.
Couldn’t happen to a nicer twat.