I don't think I've ever started a new thread before but purely done so because this is very much about both easyJet and Ryanair so wouldn't know which thread to put it in.
Interesting to see what Kenny Jacobs, Ryanair's Chief Marketing Officer said on Bloomberg and especially the brief part about easyJet.
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/videos...usiness-flyers-
When asked about Ryanair's competitive position going into primary airports and there becoming an increasing overlap with easyJet, Kenny Jacobs said...
"It's probably something easyJet think about more than Ryanair does. Anytime where we've gone to a base and been more head-to-head with easyJet we've seen them reduce rather than increase the capacity."
"We're very confident when we get to particular bases we'll be taking on any competitor and we don't see many competitors staying with us that often. But over the next number of years all LCCs will do well as the national flag-carriers continue to reduce capacity across Europe."
The question I basically want to ask is how are easyJet going to react over these next few years as Ryanair penetrate into more of their markets?
By all means I think Kenny Jacobs has hit the right nail on the head. I think all LCCs will indeed continue to do well as flag-carriers reduce their short-haul network. But easyJet do have this tendency to reduce capacity when competition intensifies, but surely there's a limit as to how long they can do this?
Personally I no longer see BA, Air France-KLM, Lufthansa etc. as the real competition for easyJet. I think it's fairly easy for them (excuse the pun) by now to come in and price out the full-service carriers and that Ryanair are becoming a bigger overall threat to them. That's surely only going to become more obvious if/when the full-service carriers further reduce capacity within Europe.
Also interesting to see a lot of their new routes this year, especially from the UK are 'thinner' holiday destinations that fly only 2 or 3 days a week. Could this maybe be an area of focus for easyJet?
I'm by no means trying to make this a 'Ryanair is better than easyJet' or vice versa but am genuinely interested in what people think is the way forward for easyJet, or indeed Ryanair in say the next 5 to 10 years...