Its been bubbling along quietly the past few days, but it seems Ryanair is going to do something it said it would never do – and that’s open a base at Frankfurt-am-Main Airport.
Ryanair Boeing 737-800 taxing at Birmingham Airport – Image, Economy Class and Beyond.
This will be Ryanair’s 85th base in Europe.
The airline is planning the following operations for Summer 2017:
- Alicante – Daily Service
- Faro – Daily Service
- Malaga – Daily Service
- Palma – Daily Service
The numbers that Ryanair are putting out for the base are small (by Ryanair standards), with two aircraft based at Frankfurt, 28 weekly flights and aiming to carry 400,000 customers/year.
That by Ryanair standards isn’t overly ambitious.
It’s interesting to see that Ryanair has chosen to start with leisure routes first, rather than business routes. It could be seen that the airline is testing the waters with Frankfurt-am-Main whilst not risking any of its traffic flow at its main Frankfurt outpost – Frankfurt Hahn.
There have been the usual quotes (on the PR Page), but as usual – the more interesting conversation is on Twitter:
Welcome to the real @Airport_FRA, dear @Ryanair. In case you get lost on such a big airport, just give us a call! #NonstopYou pic.twitter.com/x9rEnsxgYI
— Lufthansa News (@lufthansaNews) November 2, 2016
Ryanair’s response… is classic Ryanair:
.@lufthansaNews @Airport_FRA Thanks. Looks like you need a holiday. You can fly #Ryanair for €9.99. Low fares have finally come to Frankfurt
— Ryanair (@Ryanair) November 2, 2016
However, this move by Ryanair will be sending a small shock-wave with the German flag carrier – who believed Ryanairs rhetoric that turning flights around at Frankfurt would be too slow.
And the response could come in the shape of Eurowings as it squares up to Ryanair going for the attack on Lufthansa’s home base.
This could be one of the bigger stories of the year – and if Ryanair can get more slots at Frankfurt – expect the airline to go all in for an attack to establish a sizable foothold.
This could get very interesting, very fast.
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