Ryanair's income is derived from passenger and baggage fees, goods sold on the jet, real estate, credit cards, Hertz in Europe, hotels, mortgages and what not. Back in the day Ryanair cut a lucrative deal with Boeing for aircraft purchases. A number of those aircraft were subsequently sold at a pretty good profit.

In the US when you purchase an airline ticket to a specific city… it’s to a specific city. With Ryanair when you purchase a ticket to let’s say Paris, it’s actually Beauvais which is an hour bus ride to the city center.

Last year, my better half had to position from Ireland to Germany with Ryanair with 9 of her fellow crewmembers. The tickets were about 130 Euros each. The baggage charge was in the area of 2500 Euros. At the end of the day it’s a cost that was borne by the company, and not the crew. Needless to say, that was a banner flight for Ryanair.

The travelling public in Europe, the consumer, purchase their tickets, pitch up for their flight, and accept the inconveniences that go along with the low fares, be it with Ryanair, Easyjet, Air Berlin. US carriers, with the exception of Southwest, have jumped on the Ryanair band wagon as when it comes to nickel and diming their passengers for every service.

A nice feature of Ryanair is that the cabin crew aren’t hard to look at, and the fleet is young.