There's many views in the thread. Some like IOMX like travelling out and back on an early/late rotation. At £150 a ticket. Others reckon easyJet's offer (which in my experience ends up costing more with bags and seats and so on) on one flight a day somewhere in the day is better. There is reference to business people wanting to do day trips. There are many yearnings for how it used to be.
1) the world has changed. For the next year at least travel demand will be reduced by those who would normally travel frequently because of Covid. These are the frequent travellers who elect to stay safe.
2) the inclination go for of a day trip ticket for business has passed. I used to be at Ronaldsway by 6am twice a week. Then I got older and reckoned a later departure plus a hotel for an early fresh start was more efficient work wise. And I could do a client/customer dinner too. I doubt there are many who do day trips these days (other than those trying to minimise the number of nights spent in the UK for tax purposes and they tend to use their personal helicopters anyway). Curiously the Manx Airlines pricing model quoted by earlier posters charged less for the day trip; maybe they were trying to discourage people like me.
3) On Monday I flew to LHR with Loganair. No complaints about the flight, but after tramping through underground passages for about 20 minutes to reach the train station I realised why I was happy to pay a premium to go to LCY.
4) and that brings me to the point that we all have a preference for a particular London airport, driven by our personal circumstances. If I fly easyJet to LGW I have perhaps (but not always) the joy of a bus, followed by the monorail and then a 40 minute train journey to where I want to be in town, around an hour and 15 minutes typically in total. LHR T2 domestic as I discovered yesterday is similar. By contrast LHR T5 takes less than an hour. LCY is less than 40 minutes by DLR/tube; less than 30 is I splash out for a cab. LGW gives me only one (affordable) train option which is scuppered if the Gatwick to East Croyden part of the line is closed for some reason. And that happens. LHR gives me three surface options - HEX. Tube or hugely expensive cab (which costs more than the flight...). LCY also gives me three travel options - DLR/Tube, Bus/Tube and cab.
5) easyJet are hoovering up people who want to travel for nothing, and they charge late bookers like me a hefty premium for exactly the same service. My preference is to avoid that "rip off" and give a similar amount or more to the carrier that meets my needs. Having said that easyJet will let me take my usual long haul hand baggage on board (for a fee) and that is attractive. But against that with one flight a day and no interlining I could be left massively out of pocket. I would always go for the carrier with 3 flights a day for that reason.
6) I remember seeing a load of business colleagues whenever I waited for G-MIMA to take me home. Those days are also gone. Nowadays the IOM tends to be a back office for Jersey or other internationally based businesses. The bosses visit a couple of times a year if that. There are some that travel frequently still, but that handful alas doesn't keep a premium based service viable.
7) a fare of £150 isn't £150 to the airline. Deduct £26 for APD. Deduct at least £40 for airport charges. And deduct £? for CAA Nav charges, in short I doubt £40 per sector gives the airline enough to cover its own costs let alone contribute to the bottom line. Unless the aircraft is a 156 seater A319 or similar. Ir never will work for anything that seats 50-78 people.
So..IMHO what we have at the moment is all we can expect. When things improve Covidwise more will travel and more options will appear. But to complain about what we have now is to miss the point. The IOM flight market is not what it was, and until it recovers the choices will remain limited, and to some, undesirable.