Aer Lingus Rethinks its Business Model

Due to the current economic crisis, Aer Lingus has had to rethink its business model. Now the carrier has unveiled its brand new model in an attempt to drag itself out of financial trouble. The former state carrier is now calling itself Ireland’s civilized airline as part of a plan to place itself between low cost Ryanair and full service carriers like British Airways.

The carrier wants to offer more than low cost carriers, but not as much as full service carriers. Thus, the airline would be known as an airline for the middle man. The airline hopes to raise its shares in the business travel market by offering things like faster check in times and pre-paid meals for flights. However, it will not be offering premium lounges and free food and drinks like full service airlines.

The airline’s new civilized tag is seen as a swipe at arch rival Ryanair, which has already tried twice to by Aer Lingus and remains the carriers biggest shareholder. Right now Ryanair owns 29 percent of the shares in the company.

The chief executive of Aer Lingus, Christopher Muller, has planned the repositioning of the airline as a demonstration that the airline can survive and avoid a takeover by Ryanair. Muller only started working at Aer Lingus five months ago and has been trying to stem massive losses suffered by the airline as it tried to expand during a recession.

Muller said that the basis will remain a low fare offering off transportation from ‘point a’ to ‘point b’ with assigned seats. However, the customer can add on service elements like lounge access, hot meals and so on if they choose to do.