What I find annoying is that at least 2 contributors to this forum are slagging off FR while at the same time boasting that they never fly with them. All we get is cut 'n' paste friend-of-a-friend hearsay and bullsh*t advice to consider airlines whose routes go nowhere near where I want to go.
For my part I've been to the Languedoc dozens of times with FR from Stansted, with no complaints. Maybe I've been lucky and maybe I'm guilty of favourably comparing the FR experience to the abysmal standards of One railway. However. I can only speak as a I find and there are millions of us who repeatedly find FR's service satisfactory.
It's too bad that it's not posh enough for the rest but they are quite free to do the other thing and impress us with their own stories of the 'free' Daily Mail, 2 coffees and a club sandwich.