Ryanair royally messed up yesterday. In PR terms.
The self proclaimed hero of the people put profits first. And the people didn't like it one little bit.
With the Ash cloud returning to the shores of the British Isles, bullish Ryanair shored up its shoulders and announced it would fly. It was safe to fly. In fact, there was no cloud.
But with all other airlines cancelling their flights over safety concerns, the people didn't believe it's claims that all was safe in the upper atmosphere.
You see, while we might all like to moan about how inconvenient it is not to be able to get from A to B at our allotted time, and how it has temporarily ruined our lives/days/holidays, we would still much rather be alive tomorrow.
Ryanair forgot this.
It takes years to build a reputation and seconds to lose it.
Ryanair may have just lost theirs by making a decision that, clearly, put their profits before their passengers' safety. They may have believed their own hype. But the public know better and have voted with their feet - or not - you won't catch us getting on that plane......
So in PR terms, now what?
Will anyone ever get on a Ryanair flight again without giving safety a second or third thought?
What is clear is that Ryanair's PR department will be busy for days to come, and their marketing department now face an uphill battle to convince consumers that cheap flights are not synonymous with corner cutting on the safety side of things.
A tough one.
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