It will be difficult for Cork to make money at passenger volumes of less than 3 million - I think it will also depend how aggressive the DAA would want to be in using Cork to compete with Shannon once it leaves the DAA group. Look at London, LGW has been very aggressively marketed and does seem to be hurting STN, but also LHR to a lesser extent. It will be interesting to see how the DAA will compete with SNN.
These days airlines want charges to be as low as possible - so airports need to be aggressive with ancillary revenue. In my opinion there is significant room for growth of Duty Free and retail spend at ORK. The food court is underused and should be airside to get people through security as soon as possible. While it is nice to be able to relax with friends/relatives before a flight, from the airports perspective it is a massive source of potential revenue. Manchester terminal 1 is a great example of airport retail, it is a bit of a labyrnth to get through, but the environment is nice and the products are really well merchandised. Dublin T2 is also better than ORK in this respect. Food options are limited and getting worse, both Starbucks and Subway are gone, the food court closes early, as does duty free. There is a lot more that could be done with the available space at ORK on the first floor, which was poorly designed and laid-out from day one. ORK needs to utilise that space, because in the current enviornment airlines do not want to pay their way.