Skift Take
Ryanair demonstrates better than any other airline how the most important ingredient to short-term success is a very cheap entrance fee. Charge just a few pounds at the door and stick them with optional fees to get to the profits.
Ryanair passengers could find themselves paying more for snacks on board the plane than they did for the flight itself, research has shown.
The cost of food and drinks bought during the journey can amount to more than the price of a single fare with the budget airline.
Six basic items from a Ryanair in-flight menu, such as a cup of tea, a sandwich, a tin of Pringles, a Kit Kat, a bottle of water and a glass of wine, were found to cost £18.07 in total. That bill is higher than the £18 price of one-way flights currently being offered by the airline to Genoa, Warsaw and Paris.
The cost of similar items on other budget airlines come to slightly less, with the bill for the six items reaching £16.10 with Aer Lingus, and £14.75 with easyJet.
The research, by the price comparison website TravelSupermarket.com, found that some items could cost up to ten times as much as they would in supermarkets, with an 1,083 per cent mark-up on still water on an Aer Lingus flight and a 1,036 per cent price increase in the price of flapjacks on Flybe.
The figures also showed that hot drinks were the most extortionately priced – with drinks such as tea and coffee costing an average of 2,355 per cent more than they would in the supermarket. On a Ryanair flight, a 500ml bottle of still water, a cup of tea and a cup of coffee all cost £2.76 each. EasyJet charges £2.50 for tea and coffee but only £1.50 for the same size bottle of water.
| Items | ||||||
| Airline | KitKat (four finger) | Pringles (43g) | Water still (500ml) | Tea | Coffee | Walkers shortbread |
| Flybe | £1 | £1.30 | £1.70 | £2.10 | £2.10 | £1 |
| Thomson | £1.20 | £1.50 | n/a | £2.40 | £2.40 | £1 |
| Thomas Cook | n/a | £1.20 | £1.60 | £2 | £2 | £1 |
| Ryanair | n/a | £2.02 | £2.76 | £2.76 | £2.76 | £1.38 |
| easyJet | £1 | £1.75 | £1.50 | £1.50 | £2.50 | £1 |
| Monarch | £1 | £1.40 | £1.70 | £1.70 | £2.30 | £1 |
| Bmibaby | £1.20 | £1.50 | £1.70 | £1.70 | £2.20 | £1.20 |
| Jet2 | £1.20 | n/a | £1.80 | £1.80 | £2.25 | £1.20 |
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Tags: fees, food and drink, in-flight, ryanair