Management change brought Ryanair back to Manchester, says O’Leary
RYANAIR’s return to Manchester Airport just 17 months after it pulled the majority of its routes was due to a more positive attitude from its new management team, according to the airline’s chief executive Michael O’Leary.
“I think the old lot didn’t really know how to grow and presided over traffic declines for the last couple of years.
“There’s a new team in place now who realise that they’ve lost out to places like Liverpool, Birmingham and East Midlands – all of which have been growing rapidly with Ryanair services.”
The Irish budget airline has opened new routes to Alicante, Faro, Tenerife and Madrid from Manchester and increasing the frequency of its Dublin service from four to six flights per day.
Ryanair said that the routes will bring in 600,000 passengers, creating 300 jobs.
O’Leary added that based on last year’s passenger numbers at the airport of 17.5m, the extra passengers Ryanair will bring will allow it to grow visitor numbers for the first time in several years by 4% “at a stroke”.
“Two years ago Manchester refused to deal with us on the grounds of prostitution. Well, the good news is we’re all back in the sex industry.”
Ryanair will compete on three of the routes – Faro, Alicante and Tenerife – with existing operators easyJet, Jet2 and Monarch. However, Madrid-Manchester is a route which hasn’t operated since BA Connect’s service between the two cities ceased in 2007.
O’Leary has also set his sites on the tour operator companies flying passengers out
to the Mediterranean.
He said that he did not believe the routes would cannibalise sales from existing routes at Liverpool, Leeds-Bradford or Birmingham, stating that the airline’s passenger numbers increased from 66m to 72m this year and expects to increase in its current year to 78m. It will also take delivery of 40 new planes this year.
“The deal is worse than last time but we’re not delivering as much growth as we were. We’re paying higher costs now but the traffic numbers we have to deliver are lower. I think it’s a fair arrangement.
“We’ve always recognised that Manchester is an expensive airport. It’s not a Liverpool.”
He added that Manchester faces different sets of challenges as a major international airport in how it integrates lower fare operators like Ryanair into its offer alongside some of the premium, long-haul carriers.
However, he said that the management team led by new chief executive Charlie Cornish and managing director Andrew Harrison had worked with the airline on identifying specific routes and markets such as the Western Mediterranean.
“The strategy is tell us what routes you want to grow, incentivise us to do it and we’ll grow those markets.
“I hate to damn them with praise but we’ve at last got some management here who want to grow the airport.”
