In this entirely hypothetical situation I want to examine what could happen if Europe's two largest low cost carriers were to merge. This situation would never occur unless one of these two airlines were to drastically decrease in size in the coming years. However I think that it would be fun to imagine what could happen if easyJet and Ryanair were to merge.
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| easyJet A319 |
Brand Consolidation
It is highly unlikely in my opinion that these two brands would continue to operate in competition with each other. Both compete with each other and also a new mega airline would benefit operating under one image, in order to decrease marketing costs as well as offer a coherent brand image to customers. However I could also see the two airlines merging under a new title, in order to not carry through any negative PR associated with the former airlines. I imagine that this branding would consist of some what of a hybrid livery between the two current airlines, combining the two colours of blue in orange in some sort of modern livery.
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| Ryanair 737 |
Fleet Merging
Budget airlines operate on lower margins by only operating one type of aircraft, however Ryanair operates 737 aircraft and easyJet operate A320 family aircraft. Therefore to retain the one type of aircraft, one of these fleets would have to be phased out. However this would be no easy task, with both airlines operating over 300 aircraft each with a further 259 aircraft in order. Therefore a large amount of research would have to be done to determine which fleet is better to continue with. However I think this decision would most likely end up coming down to which aircraft there is greater availability of, as sourcing over 300 aircraft of one type would be almost impossible and would almost certainly rely on great amounts of cooperation from which ever manufacturer that they choose. This would also have the further effect of flooding the second hand market with large amounts of certain aircraft, driving down prices which would probably encourage other carriers to transition to these aircraft types.
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| easyJet A319 |
Competiton Rulings
A near certainty when two airlines of this size merging would be that they would be subject to pretty stringent competition rulings. This would mean that they would have to give up slots at capacity constrained airports like London Gatwick and also give up frequencies on certain routes. This would then draw in competition, as well as giving other airlines the chance to get a foothold in the larger airports at peak times, possibly opening them up to expansion plans.
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| Ryanair 737 |
Growth of other LCC
With two such large airlines merging, the loss of competition on many routes would be huge. This would allow the new larger carrier to drive up prices due to their monopoly and also start dropping their standards of service. This however would allow other airlines to start competing with them, on both a price stand point and also by offering a higher level of service. I would imagine that in the UK the gap would be filled by either Norweigan or by an expansion of either Leval or Vueling. In France I imagine that Transavia would fill up the slack. In the Iberian peninsula as well as Italy I would imagine that Vueling would be the airline to fill the gap, and in the German speaking countries it would almost certainly be Eurowings with the backing of the Lufthansa group. However on top of this I could also see many new LCC being set up and competing, increasing the amount of competition beyond the new mega carrier.
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| easyJet A319 |
So this is what I think could happen if Ryanair and easyJet were to ever merge. Comment bellow if there are any other airlines that you would like to see me do this with. Also be sure to check out my Twitter and my Instagram, both @lines_aviation.
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