Ruinair. Paul Kilduff

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      1993

      Buy six second-hand Boeing 737s from Britannia. Employ 503 staff and fly 1,120,000 passengers.

      1994

      Appoint Mick as Chief Executive Officer. Chuck out the old BAC planes and use only Boeing 737s. Employ 523 staff and fly 1,666,000 passengers.

      1995

      Overtake BA and Aer Lingus to become the biggest passenger carrier on the Dublin to London route, the busiest international air route in Europe, largely due to the water, making train travel difficult and driving even more hazardous. Open your first UK domestic route, flying from Stansted to Glasgow Prestwick. Celebrate your tenth anniversary in business. Buy four Boeings from Dutch airline Transavia bringing the fleet size to eleven 737s. Employ 523 staff and fly 2,260,000 passengers.

      1996

      Open new routes to Leeds, Bradford, Cardiff and the Bournemouth Riviera. Buy eight more ‘slightly used with one careful owner’ Boeings from Lufthansa. The EU completes the Open Skies deregulation of airlines in Europe allowing free competition on all internal routes. Cancel Mick’s lucrative profit-sharing deal and give him 22 per cent of the airline instead. Employ 605 staff and fly 2,950,000 passengers.

      1997

      Jet off to the continent and start four new routes to Stockholm, Oslo, Paris and Brussels, or at least within sixty miles of these cities. Buy two more 737s bringing the fleet to 21 aircraft. Float your company on the Dublin and New York NASDAQ Stock Exchanges and watch the airline’s share price double on the first day of trading, valuing the company at €300 million. Employ 659 staff and fly 3,730,000 passengers.

      1998

      Open new routes to Malmo, St Etienne, Carcassonne (where?), Venice (or close), Pisa and Rimini. Order 45 new Boeings for two billion US dollars, being 25 firm orders and 20 options, an option being a sort of Irish aircraft order—sure we might buy the planes or we might not, but sure they’re only seventy million bucks a shot so sure well let you know either way later on…like. Employ 892 staff and fly 4,629,000 passengers.

      1999

      Go mad and open new routes to Frankfurt (close), Biarritz, Ostend (where now?), Ancona, Genoa, Turin, Derry and Aarhus. Employ 1,094 staff and fly 5,358,000 passengers.

      2000

      Launch an online flight booking facility which garners 50,000 bookings per week. Live with the eternal shame of one of your cabin crew named Brian Dowling winning Big Brother. Sponsor the Sky News weather forecast to raise your profile. Employ 1,262 staff and fly 7,002,000 passengers using 26 aircraft.

      2001

      Fly Tony Blair and family to their holidays in Carcassonne in France and milk the resultant publicity for all it is worth. Post 9/11 watch other airlines panic and oil prices soar but immediately order 100 new Boeings plus options on 50 more, the biggest aircraft order of the year. Open your first continental base at Brussels Charleroi and drive Belgium’s Sabena Airlines livid (an airline that only made a profit in one of the prior forty years and thus soon to be bankrupt and whose name stands for Such A Bad Experience, Never Again). Employ 1,467 staff and fly 9,355,000 passengers using 36 aircraft.

      2002

      Open your second continental base in the small peasant village of Hahn, seventy miles from Frankfurt. Start flying on 26 new routes in all. Become Europe’s number one airline in terms of punctuality, fewest cancellations and least lost luggage. Employ 1,547 staff and fly 13,419,000 passengers using 41 aircraft.

      2003

      Buy out a competitor, Buzz, from KLM for 24 million euros and relaunch their routes for half the fares. Become the largest airline operating at London Stansted. Open new continental bases in Milan (or Bergamo) and Stockholm (or Skavsta). Another Gulf War. Mount a mock invasion of Lootin’ airport in a tank for the publicity. Launch 73 new routes. Overtake British Airways for the first time by carrying more passengers in a month in Europe. Employ 1,746 staff and fly 19,490,000 passengers using 54 aircraft.

      2004

      Become the most searched airline on the web as ranked by the teenage billionaire gurus at Google. Open bases near Rome and Barcelona. Warn of a ‘bloodbath’ on fares in the winter months and consequently watch your own share price nosedive in a freefall. Watch the European Union expand eastwards and salivate at the prospect of all those potential passengers. Employ 2,288 staff and fly 24,635,000 passengers using 72 aircraft.

      2005

      Fly ten UK Conservative Party officials to their annual conference at Blackpool for a fare of one penny. Mick turns down an offer from the BBC to play the Alan Sugar role in the hit TV series The Apprentice. Open new bases at Liverpool, Pisa, East Midlands, Cork and Shannon. Order another 70 Boeings just for the heck of it but tell Boeing to skip the window shades, reclining seats and seat pockets to save a few euros. Note that you can squeeze 59 more seats into a new Boeing 737-800 than in an old Boeing 737-200. Carry more passengers in August than British Airways on their entire worldwide network, and thus claim to be ‘The World’s Favourite Airline’ (despite the fact that Southwest Airlines in the us carry twice as many passengers). Go on at length always about a ‘no fuel surcharge ever’ guarantee as oil prices soar. Employ 2,700 staff and fly 30,946,000 passengers using 87 aircraft.

      2006

      Open bases in Bremen, Madrid and Marseilles. Accept the delivery of your hundredth shiny new Boeing 737. Fly for the first time outside Europe by opening new routes to Morocco. Launch an online check-in service which was free but now, like everything else, costs money. Make an all-cash offer for Aer Lingus and refer to it as a ‘small regional airline’ despite the fact that Aer Lingus flies to the us and Middle East and your airline doesn’t. Employ 4,200 staff (of 25 different nationalities but 24 of them being Eastern European) and fly 42,500,000 passengers using 103 aircraft.

      2007

      Open bases in Alicante, Valencia, Belfast, Bristol and Dusseldorf Weeze. For the first time sell seats for one cent including taxes, fees and charges and watch your bookings website grind to a halt with four million hits on a single day. Launch ‘BING’ which delivers fare specials direct to customers’ computers. Discuss the possibility of a future low fares airline flying between Europe and the USA with fares from ten euros and consider calling it RuinAtlantic or Ego Air. Mourn the passing of Tony Ruin, accede to his last request and fly one Ruinair Boeing 737 aircraft over his funeral in County Kildare in a not so silent final tribute. Employ 4,500 staff and fly 50,000,000 passengers using 133 aircraft.

      2008

      Open bases in Birmingham and Bournemouth. Announce that the possible new low fares airline to the USA will have ‘beds and blowjobs’ СКАЧАТЬ