Low-Cost Airlines: Sky High or Grounded?

The increase of package holidays across the UK is clearly evident. Low-cost airlines like Thomas Cook and TUI are aware that many Brits are lazy and will sacrifice extra paychecks to ‘queue jump’ the hassle of booking a holiday the old-fashioned way.

Instead, all aspects of what previously made booking a holiday stressful have been eliminated so that transport, accommodation, food and leisure activities are all sorted before you even leave the store. As you have full control over where you stay, the attention tends to divert away from how you get there and this is where airlines such as Ryanair, EasyJet and Jet2 take off.

Low-cost airlines are pretty self-explanatory. Managers take every aspect of what makes flying expensive and make it cheaper. This is done in several ways, and it’s genuinely interesting too. Let’s take EasyJet, which was rated the world’s second best low-cost airline in 2019 by the World Airline Awards.

If you look at the destinations of EasyJet, they tend to stay out of busy airports such as London Heathrow as landing fees are very expensive, which would warrant an increase in the cost of a ticket. Therefore, EastJet schedules many flights to London Stansted, Gatwick and Luton airports. As these destinations are on the outskirts of the capital, they save more money for the airline and keep ticket costs low.

Furthermore EasyJet’s entire fleet of 329 planes are of only two varieties of Airbus aircraft, meaning money is saved on training pilots, co-pilots and cabin crew on several different types of planes. 

The 9/11 events which devastated the world in 2001 had drastic impacts on the aviation industry. As passenger numbers dropped, airlines were losing millions on a daily basis, particularly on trans-Atlantic flights.

Meanwhile, several low-cost airlines invested into this golden opportunity when planes were significantly cheaper to buy to place massive orders of hundreds of brand new aircraft. Now these companies now have enough planes to open up new routes to places with a smaller status.

Ryanair have single-handedly helped the relatively unknown city of Zadar in Croatia become a massive holiday destination, just because they fly there for only £12.99! Some of these planes are now approaching 20-years-old, and they’re still running daily to your favourite holiday destinations there and back, there and back, and there and back.

RYANAIR will give you a £2 flight but tell you that you need to stick your hands out the plane and flap.

— Jam (@lifeofjam_) August 15, 2019

These budget airlines are so light on the pocket that jokes often pop up across the internet. One person on YouTube commented that they’d “once bought some fries and a drink on a Ryanair flight”, only to find that they were “more expensive than the flight itself”. The word is flying around that Ryanair is practically giving away flights all across Europe, so exactly how long can these budget airlines cope with the rising demand of customers? I’m sure a route will be found.

On one final note, just remember that the next time you complain of a lack of foot space or that your plane seat doesn’t recline, remember that you’re jetting off to another country for cheaper than a medium-sized Domino’s pizza…that’ll make anyone relax.