That's absurd. Southwest's model puts employees first, then customers, then shareholders. RyanAir puts shareholders first, second, and third. Anything to make a quick buck.

Correction. Almost anything to make a quick buck. Eschewing fuel fees is good marketing and admirable.

"Best customer service"? Or is it best, worst, and only customer service on 436 specific routes that no other airline serves? Or is it "best" from the point of view of shareholders? The Air France ground staff is infamous, but they aren't compensated based on how many extra Euros they can extract from customers they "serve".

If RyanAir survives its fares will eventually need to cover costs without any revenue boost from ambush airport fees. Either the fees will be dropped or a higher and higher fraction of customers will learn how to avoid them. If the fees were intended as a temporary revenue source to bootstrap the company it might almost make sense to me. All except the fact that when you treat one customer unfairly, as judged by that customer, he tells 20 of his acquaintances.

Southwest's model reverses that rule. If you consistently treat the customer fairly when your competition does not, word of mouth will build inexorably in your favor. Southwest operates like Costco: Good quality at a fair price. RyanAir operates like a marginal used car dealer: Buyer beware.

I wouldn't be surprised to see RyanAir attempt to transition its model to no-fees when fee income drops far enough at RyanAir and more importantly at its competitors. It's even conceivable that raising fees to extortionate levels is designed to accelerate this process: leading competitors to match fees at levels which lose revenue. But who knows what's inside the mind of a used car dealer?