How to develop a successful airline ... start small and expand from there ...
Love him or hate him how did Ryanair start ... with stretched state-of-the-art B737's, with less than state-of-the-art BAC1-11's ...
Nope, in the old days there were literally three functioning airports in the Irish Republic, namely DUB, SNN and ORK.
Ryanair started out with a clapped out fleet of Budgies and carved a niche for themselves serving the other regional airports of the Irish Republic, never mind operating costs per bum on seat etc
Realistically, there was a Ryanair Mk. I and there is a Ryanair Mk. II.
Mk. I with the Budgies and BACs and its business model and route network was on the brink of insolvency when MOL was brought in and pretty much scrapped Ryanair Mk. I to re-invent Ryanair Mk. II.Other than the name, the 1980s / early 1990s Ryanair has little to do with the airline of today.
PS: I think they started with a Bandeirante.